Blue Seas, White Stars, Green Skirts

after Gerald Stern

What I took to be the great wave off Kanagawa

turned out to be Van Gogh
thinking he should use more orange;
and what I took to be a solar system
with two suns as the two centres of the ellipse
turned out to be a colony of ants
set out to feast on a dead lizard.

It was my brain fooling me,

sending me false images,
turning fishes into snakes
and crotchets into nebula.

It was my brain that betrayed me completely

sending me utterly uncoded material,
for what I thought was a blueprint for an assassination
turned out to be history picking applause apart,
and what I thought was an avalanche
turned out to be crumbs a diner left behind,
and what I thought was, finally, an embrace
between man and woman
turned out to be an advertisement banner
for Pandora's box, 25 percent off.

I used to be believe the brain did its work

with all its eighty-six billion neurons, its gray matter
and white, and skullfuls water — all you need
is to feed it with images of beauty, so I drew
blue seas, white stars, green skirts
on every wall of every room I lived in,
to glut its hunger, I wandered through labyrinths
of symphonies — the circumbinary planet of my body, moving
through star dunes of great sound.

Now when it rains, I pause

the music. And sometimes I clap.
It was a poet who taught me clapping
is how hands mourn. Once incapable to tame the monkey
that is my mind, flies that are my fingers,
the restless ant that is my body,
I took to clapping, burning, making waves.
I am ready to reverse everything now
for the sake of the brain:

I am ready to consider the distinction between snowflakes,

ready to respond to Van Gogh's irises, blossoms, poppies,
ready to behold the skeleton of the Milky Way
in the canvas of my eyes,
and I am, finally, ready to rejoice with my hands.

For it was the gravity of your name,

and not the ache of separation that oppressed me,
and it was my right hand, full of ballads and blessings
and not my left hand whose rivers had burned,
and it was the impression of blue on my face
and not the many cumuli in the sky,
or the snakes of my fingerprints moving in secret,
and it was not really the past of a woman drowning,
and it was not Marilyn Monroe standing on the subway breeze,
and it was not a bee blowing out the brains of a dandelion,
and it was not my crown of darkness or dazzle,
and it was not the Rosetta Stone that unearthed in my sleep,
and it was not the Ganges in my right palm, or the aria of my breath.

It the brittle house of my loneliness,

and my confusion.
It was a boy in a green skirt wearing a tie
made of the thread of life,
he was mistaken about his place on earth.
I did not believe him painting sunflowers beside me,
even though he was me.