on this planet all things faraway shimmer blue
		--------------------------------------------------------

		yes i run fantasies on time all the time
		ghosts of trains on a track
		overgrown with grass blade-gifting weeds
		still -- fit for picking seven kinds of wildflowers

		so.  in this particular dream (a 5:28 local to my bed)
		i unlock the door to my homestead -- our homestead --
		i walk in
		there you are on the couch
		sitting braced expecting having traveled -- and you say
		they let me in

		i am certain that all my life
		with all the other people -- women mother father sister
		i have rehearsed this laying grief to rest:

		i will brush your brow
		i will cup your face
		you will brush my brow
		you will cup my face

		survival is the point of embrace
		anything more would kill us.

		we are the ghost steam-engines of the good old days
		not yet gone by.  drink, my older sister.  you are without
		a little brother -- in polish you would say: bez bratka.

		i am your sharp blue vase
		you are my round blue pitcher
		and the seven kinds of wildflowers will keep
		if we press them among the leaves of the book
		where heros sing charms and things actually get done
		that way yes.  have you noticed love?
		we have been singing.


			Marek Lugowski
			1 August 2000
			Chicago, Illinois

			[rev 2 August]