IN THE CROWDED COUNTRY Poem by K. Schippers

Suspect, look out,
poems here
soon petrify
into proverbs.

Travel
quickly to
the inaccessible
closeness that

for want of
summits
stirs

in secret.

Can you still
hear something
there,
an echo?

Quiet,
it's just
an
impression in

black-and-white
of a sound
in colour.

Is it helping?
So little, too much
this soon.

How do
the tears and
folds

get into
the dust jacket
of

a book
that is
hardly ever

touched?