From Catabolism

A body is not always everything we are taught

to expect. Functions of the self accommodated

into parts — eyes, ankle, lobe, pelvis — to orient us.

The whole is no secret. Toenails and hair as nodules

of enquiry so body is a text to acknowledge the self

that is not there. Many years we toil to be freed

from ornamentation. I do not determine the use

of the naked body except to suggest that weather

conditions be tracked. In an arena of absolutes,

the final destination is written in numbers.

What comes after is avoided like our fear

of tiny hairy creatures.

Copyright © 2009 Tsering Wangmo Dhompa All rights reserved
from Fourteen Hills
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission