If I Have Run Out Of Weapons

to shake at the page,
the blank world,

it is not because I am empty. My
hands are always full of something,
but when the hammers and
pins are lost

numb fingers can still be very clever.

I have been at the buckles today,
the straight jackets done up, white
like empty worlds; and I have been
knitting ferocious spiders
to spin their webs across the ceiling.

I have tickled the belly of the
three headed dog, and now
I'm working at picking out
this knot:

a tangle of failures
as smooth as oiled secrets,
as tight as a garotte around the
throat of an angel, balanced on
the head of a pin;

there are other dangers
just as sudden
that can spring from my
curious fingers;

and while I am working at undoing this
potential for savage reunion with the world,
which is as empty as it was in the beginning,

puzzle this:

my dreams were never violent,
but they promised
that all things will come.