THE THIEF
  
 When he stole from her
 it was in a fever of gentleness
 as if this act of movement towards her
 was grand thievery from the past centuries.
  
 He saw his theft as a gift
 his new language created just for her
 the beginning of a secret script between them
 the characters of milk white hands
 that clasps the ancient teapot,
 their own sacred ceremony.
  
 When something missing was always present.
  
 A flower from her hair when she awakened 
 a letter from him 
 a small rice bowl
 several white petals plucked from
  
 The Moon Garden.
  
 These are the stems of shadow he leaves for her 
  
 Hanakotoba
  
 The Language of Flowers
  
 In the height of tall plants and the presence of thorns 
 these were the words between them
  
 without words.
  
 Amaririsu 
 When there were only their faces.
  
 Tsubaki
 When the room was red 
 and she was perishing with grace.
  
 Saboten
 When only their bodies remained. 
  
 Shion
 The time of remembrance.
  
 Every night after he died 
 she left the screen door slightly open.
 In the hope he would once again return 
 to steal something from her.
  
 It is the hope of many a jasmine flower.

  
  
 THE NIGHT DANCER
  
 Like a fever
 hers was a mystery that we all wanted.
 When she danced there was a long deep moan against the stars.
 A wild creature, she stalked our sleeping movements with quiet precision. 
 Her voice 
 swollen against our bodies.
 Her face 
 clung to the night like a Picasso.
 Her razor blade jaw cut shapes around us
 in the darkness —
 a watered lip
 the silhouette of an arm
 a widowed eye watching 
 a bead of sweat on a lovers wrist.
 The mist and heat of the night garden
 conspired against us.
 Born under the star of Aphrodite 
 this was her Parthenon, 
 her scripture.
 When she danced
 the moonlight entered the waters of herself, 
 she was the medium for the spirit of her body’s movement,
 bare foot to
 white ankle to raised calf
 to thigh 
 to fingertip 
 the arch of her neck
 undulating with the darkness
 the swirl of
 our delirium in the glitter of the night. 
  
 Her Sacred Art
 Like a swan she glided back
 into the great wound
 and danced away the sea of our longing.
 This was our hymn,
 as we fell away from the world.
  
  
  
 ONE PERFECT LINE
  
 If I could write one true perfect line
 I would build a new Jerusalem of words 
 upon it.
  
 With no borders or margins along this parchment
 beneath the letters of 
 the many stained glass windows 
 and ancient doors,
 there would hide the burden 
 of the terrible weight of love.
  
 I would weave a tapestry from Budapest 
 around it.
  
 In between the shutters and thread
 along the wisps of smoke 
 in the darkened room of black bells
 where the dogs howl,
 outside the morning chant would begin.
  
 I would write it in pencil,
 the gráphō —
  
 It would be the horizontal branch
 in the interior of a star
 the bridge for Homers’ dreams
 the stardust in 
  
 The Winds of Herodotus 
  
 Lovers would lie down in that fine valley 
 between pencil and ink
 in the white sheets of abandon;
 on their secret page; without shame,
 their filament of desire.
  
 It would be the narrow trail 
 of the Bedouin before the sand 
 covers the sentence,
 the long thin mark on the surface of
 the shared stone of discontent 
 the wire that conducts the traveling 
 history of anger,
 the track in our skin of communal grief.
  
 If I could write one true perfect line
 it would be a scar upon the heavens 
  
 and I would not bleed.



  

Mark Tarren is a poet and writer who lives on remote Norfolk Island in the South Pacific.
His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in various literary journals including The New Verse News, The Blue Nib, Poets Reading The News, Street Light Press, Spillwords Press and Tuck Magazine. He is currently working on a collection of poetry and a novel.