1

I open my right hand slowly,
turn the palm up,
look at it.
and the left, too.
I breathe in 
the redolent possibilities of morning,
and realize
it doesn't matter to the hands,
or the alveoli in the lungs,
who the President is.

2

The purpose of life
is not to write a book,
but life itself.

3

It's important to let go,
to remember how the atoms 
that make up who I am
once drifted free in space
until the desire to come together
brought them all in one place
where they fused into a spinal cord, 
a brain,
and how I look at the world.
I tell myself: 
Let go.
Remember.

All manner of afflictions disappear.

4

All the world could be in flames.
I choose not to burn.

5

How comes this together?
I sit here
Writing this
Alone.
But I write for everyone -
For poetry
as much makes us what we are 
as the cooing in my courtyard
when the sun kisses the rim
makes a morning dove.





			Brandywine
			5/14/99