True Discourse on Power Poem by Peter Gizzi

When I say the ghost has begun
you understand what is being said.
That time is not how we keep it
or measure
first there was then wasn't . . .
It twitters and swerves like
the evening news.
Now outside is 3D. Inside non-
representational space.
Every law has an outside
and inside
I have witnessed cruelty
break and gulp and sweat then
punch out a smile.
To be awake. This talking in space.
To be absorbed in the ongoing.
Belief's a shadow to be looked into
and into
until relief is gone. The dark
triangle settled in the midst of
traffic is on us.
Time comes in adverbial bursts,
a glass of beer, a smoke . . .
The evening air refreshes, startles,
and the questions grow deeper like
shadows across storefronts.
A forsythia ticking against
the dirty pane.
This was time. Up. Down. Up.
And you were a part of it.
If I say it can you feel it now?
Imagine. Lightning strikes. Rain
falls and drives.
Clouds pass. Night clarified. Stars.
In silent pictures the tree falls
in the optic nerve.
The sound is chemistry.
There's no getting to it or if
getting to it
feels like the actual sound
is that silence?
Alone here with my shadows
drawn . . .
So what's this about?
A horse and a castle, a tree
and its leaving?
What's this about in solitary
splendor?
The undertow and its threshold,
a door and the opening sky?
Or because a play of reflection
lit up my bumper
and caught my eyes
I saw the shadow of a falcon.
Because a sound a poor man
uttered
reached my ear I fell into song.
If the syntax of loyalty is not tragic
then what is the wager?
If there were time, would it be ours?