I know you, ice man.
I know your fingers as no man can,
and the bones of your wrist, the joints of your thumb.
I know the knobbly coruscations of your veins
and the movement of your blood like silent rain.
Your opposed muscles thrill to an electric hum.

And your tendons: I know them best of all.
From their buried sheaths I can hear the call
they scream in burning. They are dry ice wire.
Stubborn and stiff,
tensed in anticipation of synovial shift
they carry your will through tunnels of fire.

but I don’t know what burns so down so deep
beneath the bones and the marrow meat
what makes the fire that guides your days
what has built this city and forged your chains
has made this guide for your changing daze
I know it reaches from the ember blaze
for the trees flying free for the bitter sun
it whips your ankles to make you run

I know you, grand vizier of pain.
I know you as master of silent rain
and as the goad to waking, the god of the sun.
I know your blocky, quiet force
that wells without end from a single source
to flood the many with the sea of one.

And I know you in your antipodes,
the world of brimming and quiet ease,
your islands open for languid inspection.
I know you, half-lit, through a thin veil,
a vista of rich ecstasy at the end of the trail.
You keep me moving in that direction.

September 20, 1975

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