Laynie Browne

from Practice Has No Sequel  

                                     
In all mystifying darkness resides a fox, shaking wet-red all over your doorstep. No porch is distant. When you begin to dream again, in that distracted and exhausting way, as if you may be working harder in sleep—do not forget dream as tincture, invisible constitutional, though you may find it impossible to decipher. Darkness inside your body is indisputable and yet what emanates from your person is the opposite of sublunary. Compose your path of light.

 


from Practice Has No Sequel  


In the morning I empty my bodies. I am most empty of gowns, rooms, and names. I detach my moons, uncoil my webs, disperse every fountain, until I stand devoid of form. The question, how to move, even across the room, does not occur, as place is no longer static. The local floats. My tongue is stitched exactly to that reservoir—or am I standing on the banks of my own peristaltic inner rooms? The rushing—is still. Practice has no accounting, no particular occasions or premises. We are accom-panied without ever setting out or knowing our own dimensions, where one bristling thought ends or crinolines form a wake. We carefully wash our dreams until we can see reflections on their sinuous surfaces, yet they seem to have no exteriority or skin, no covering, and the reflections do not match any of the selves we have carefully framed. The last perplexing sentence must be found in the depths of a painted rose before the blossom opens its rooms—before we are drowned by scent—or steady intoxication of color. We have tended the banks of this flower as if the petals were aisles—eaves—waves. 

 
Laynie Browne

Laynie Browne’s recent books include: In Garments Worn by Lindens, Periodic Companions, and The Book of Moments. Her honors include a Pew Fellowship, the National Poetry Series Award, and the Contemporary Poetry Series.  She teaches at University of Pennsylvania and at Swarthmore College.

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