Las Herramientas del Descubramiento

Who caught you in that camera flame,
thumb-twist strap on a boyish arm?
Who created, bullied day?
Who numbed me raw?

This piece is an awl, this tool a file -
I drive a hole in the darkened page,
a hook to hang you from, a point,
and twist new words about your frame.

A scribing point to leave a line,
to etch blood-springs in your ankle's grain;
a diagonal rib, that arc-chamber.
A brutal corner, a coppered bone.

I labour here not for love, nor affection;
there is nothing of ambition in it,
nor care for the heart's common wage -

but work instead to raise a song, a silvered gut,
a threaded light in the streaming air.
A bone-glue gleaming, fixing, inside the pan.

One note elect like a fish on fire,
one word like a needle to capture form.