At the beginning I noticed the huge stones on my path I knew instinctively why they were there breathing as naturally as animals I moved them to ritual patterns I abraded my hands and made blood prints   Last week I became aware of details cubes of fool’s gold green and blue copper crystal formations fossils    shell casts iron roses     candied gems   I thought of the Empress Josephine, the Burning of Troy between her breasts, of Ivan the Terrible lecturing on the virtues of rubies. They were dilettantes.   By the turn of the week I was madly in love with stone. Do you know how beautiful it is to embrace stone to curve all your body against its surfaces?   Yesterday I began seeing you as desirable as a stone I imagined you coming onto the path with me even your mouth a carved stone   Today for the first time I noticed how coarse my skin has grown but the stones shine with their own light, they grow smoother and smoother

I felt a Funeral, in my Brain, And Mourners to and fro Kept treading — treading — till it seemed That Sense was breaking through —   And when they all were seated,       A Service, like a Drum —  Kept beating — beating — till I thought       My mind was going numb —   And then I heard them lift a Box      And creak across my Soul With those same Boots of Lead, again,      Then Space — began to toll,   As all the Heavens were a Bell,        And Being, but an Ear, And I, and Silence, some strange Race,        Wrecked, solitary, here —   And then a Plank in Reason, broke,        And I dropped down, and down — And hit a World, at every plunge,       And Finished knowing — then —