Volcanic
You woke me from my deep, warm, milky slumber,
I feeling safely bound by your encumber-
ing hands, as hot as ash upon my face,
as if volcanoes were the ancient race
of men whose sympathy does not refuse
the pain that makes the blacks and breaks the blues
that lead me up the flaming sides to dip
my heart into the cauldron at the tip.
I’m wide awake now, wider than I’ve been
in all the years I lived down in the lean
damp valleys at the foot, and never looked
into the skies to see smoke billows crook’d
and shredding to the east, the telltale sign
of all that could be me, but wasn’t mine.