When the taps run with tears

In the facecloth parcel up the little cry. Let it well with the suds. With your fingers, with what is left, crunch up the crystals from the soap dish. Rub such salt against forearm, shoulder, shin and knee skin; sand out the rough grains of today. In the giant bowl of liquid, soak off the

A Bequest of Wonder

Within the confines of a silken sheet, the observers attend upon the temple. Before it returns to ash and dust, they light a votive offering. It is   in a portrait the thumbnail of the painter’s right hand   the sparse arm-hairs of a samurai beset by ghosts   the frog at the woman’s feet,