until

Until each breath refuses they, those, them.
Until the Dramatis Personae of the book’s first page says, “Each one is you.”
Until hope bows to its hopelessness only as one self bows to another.

 Until cruelty bends to its work and sees suddenly: I.

Until anger and insult know themselves burnable legs of a useless table.
Until the unsurprised unbidden knees find themselves bending.

 Until fear bows to its object as a bird’s shadow bows to its bird.

 Until the ache of the solitude inside the hands, the ribs, the ankles.

 Until the sound the mouse makes inside the mouth of the cat.

 Until the inaudible acids bathing the coral.

Until what feels no one’s weighing is no longer weightless.
Until what feels no one’s earning is no longer taken.
Until grief, pity, confusion, laughter, longing know themselves mirrors.
Until by we we mean I, them, you, the muskrat, the tiger, the hunger.
Until by I we mean as a dog barks, sounding and vanishing and
sounding and vanishing completely.

Until by until we mean I, we, you, them, the muskrat, the tiger, the
hunger, the lonely barking of the dog before it is answered.

~ Jane Hirshfield

from Ledger