Mute marriages:
the ten-ton block of ice
obstructing the throat, the heart,
the red filter of the liver,
the clogged life.

It is a glacier
in which frozen children swim
ground round with boulders,
pebbles, bits of stone
from other ice ages.

Here a lapis glitters,
here a shard of bottle glass--
valuables & junk:
the history of a house
told in its garbage cans,
the history of a life
in its nightmares.

Speak the dream.
Follow the red thread
of the images.
Defrost the glacier
with the live heat
of your breath,
propelled by the heart's
explosion.

© Erica Mann Jong

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