human skin

(or, dendrochronology)

human skin
may have been
the original
poem

with all of its
elbows and
ribs
and lobes

stigmas
styles
ovaries
ovules

its river bottoms
with colored pebbles
its exotic and
invisible wounds

the way it wades into
waters
over its own
head

and how it colors itself
with sky
and shades itself
in summer

as if it were a
blue heron
with a giant menacing
beak

which longs to walk long
legged through
pressed cotton
sheets

leaving wild unintelligible
markings
droppings
incendiary devices

which shivers itself
awake
or
drinks itself asleep

oozes or dips
its pen in
deep sea
ink

every age
of this poem
leaves
rings

raises its limbs
reaches
touches
roots