the poet after being called to his vocation

             i

I'm looking at you looking at me:
you're looking at me looking at you -- 
until now, Beloved, how could I have known
that we are always in both worlds at once?

             ii

After I said, "I do," Beloved, it wasn't    
a matter of the ring being placed
on my finger so much as me 
stepping into the Ring.

               iii

It's all so complicated, Beloved,
that I may forget...
Then again, it's so simple
that I may be afraid.

                iv

I can't contain myself! Quick!
Go fetch a cosmos!

     ... All right then, any threshold
will do, as long as through it --
forever without end, Beloved --
you come and go,
                  come and go.

                 v

Now only through your eyes, Beloved,
does my every expression have face value.
But had I not heard your voice saying,
"Mother and Father love you,
follow the Self-begotten Son,"
I would never have known that your
every train of thought was telepathic,
nor that I had arrived, finally, at my
            destin-y-ation.
           

Botsford, Alan. mamaist: learning a new language. Kamakura, Japan, Minato No Hito, 2002.