It is the chasm in the beggar's mouth where the bread spews out,
the Monday church, a winter pool,
the stalemate of the jury in deliberation
of a dilemma that knows no rule--
a cleft in the face of the law.

The crescent beneath your fingernails, forgotten cells,
dilapidated cars of rust and sun bleached pastels,
skin between freckles...
and the place in the window where the ball passed.

It is the unmade, empty bed,
the permanent indent on his pillow,
the hollow between her collarbones,
a missing rib.

Abandoned wells,
incorrectly witched and drilled,
the singing cave inside a shell
and cracks where rodents dwell.

Retired subway tunnels.
Translation stutters...
it does not exist -
the word.

Dancers suspended in a sweaty step,
festering in tension 'till the lead takes the next
--it's the space between their chests.

Vacuous eyes in the man who forgets:
forgets a name,
forgets his brother,
forgets that he is living.
It's the loss of religion
like an auctioned off, foreclosed home,
ready to be filled again.
The depressed, the forsaken, the condemned.

The innards of the flute,
the void inside the noose,
the rests in the battering of the snare.

The nook between heavy breasts
or a set of elevated legs.

It's in the room of a child, grown and gone: a museum, gathering dust.
The room of the baby never born, play things dangling, decorations untouched.

And a middle child,
happily making a tent of his bed sheets,
while the oldest is applauded for his achievement
and the youngest is fed.

The square of pavement at an intersection when every light is red.

The standoff of armies on barren land
eyes flying across the pasture,
flitting from face to face.

The porous places in salt and spices,
gravel and worm-ridden grains,
hollow hearts and phantom pains,
missing limbs
and keyholes.

The distance between ants, connected through an invisible synapse.
Blank pieces of canvas.

Closed restaurants with chairs stacked on tables and shining, checkered floors.
The anticipation in the atmosphere just before it pours,
and sure,
it's the silence before the comment on the weather.

Cisco town, where nobody lives no more for a 100 miles 'round--
just an old general store, looks like it's been to war
bullet holes in the front door.
Stretches of long, dusty desert in every direction,
sandstone and sky,
without interruption--

just the quiet pause in conversation
between my mate
and me.