Eternity Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(i)

After the low clouds
that sank in a one-way traffic
into the valley
of a departed flower,

that jewel of a girl
always dressed in the lake ripples
of a dawn-hued smile,

we've lived in nests
woven out of threads
a thousand miles
long off her island,

a sky-scraping castle
on an elephant
mountain, whisking
the a tit's tail
of a beaded breeze.

(ii)

We've been spun
by the helices of her breath
to spin and swirl
in the chopper
of a bowled hug.

We bowed to earth,
but grew suns
to jump and pole vault
over towers

to the sun in its cubicle
on a ceiling over
a ceiling, an attic
stretching out eyes of roses.

And raced to climb
to the green crowns
of Hyperion trees

to pick gems of leaves
to spiral in the living room.

(iii)

Underneath her bed,
a floss of woven hairs
and strayed filaments

from spurting fibers
flailing down to the legs
of a bed too heavy
to lift, but lighter

than the spinning wheels
of her breath and wind.

Air in her room
flapped the wings of the dove,
opened the eyes of a kite

cruising to a mountain,
a white lily waiting

for the whistle-on-squeak
to pick a petal for a slot
beneath her pillow.

(iv)

Under her bed, a river
of leaves from the tree
of her memory

and cotton fibers from her breath
flows and bloats
to stand us on a floor,

her steps leaving marble prints
we search for
and mine in shafts of air
that melted, as she departed.

Only to cling to bowls
in forts of memory
growing a flower that never withers.