Self-Portrait At A Distance Poem by William Conley Lowrance

When I am in the water, clotted with the stars,
I start to hum—then sing—with a perverse longing
for the city. I wake up a ghost with blurred edges,
or as a distant mourner attending your wake.

Reduced to a fallen object—sealed in your hands—
I will be like champagne—& only my molars will last.
I will only walk through slanted, well-lit backstreets
to experience a succession of tropic scenes.

I will not walk alone, swung loose from this petrified sky.
I will find your eyes in the traffic lights—
& will be released from this spinning
only by the bonfire of our faces.