.

a theory of épice




when dreams
churn evensongs
to nocturned nights
and number airs that measure
light in lid-less cloudbound eyes


unbalanced
by eratic flight
through dusk past
feathered-white on cheeks
from ear-to-mouth and back again


with no direct
connecting line to
theories of épice*, of spice
that sprays from wings to flavoured beads
of ratios that whooosh the night with one strong stroke


to three
mid notes to six
weak ones like lines to ink
that brush a slide from Arches to archived
orchestrations, lessons papered deep in surfaces,


composing kinships,
dominance devined from
many sides with no grey-veiled values
folding fears to mouths to eyes to ears, not that,
just ties, dynamic contributions, one to three to six


in balanced sight
of final forms that hide
a shadowed heart from morn,
sow seeds of asymetricalities dispersed
by honking dawn like dew-billed beaks wiped


wide-awake
by non sense linearities,
soft-swallowed dreams dripped
dry by evensong exposed to day, that
doesn't cook things up in quite that way







*Footknown

In music, if you distribute the dynamics
in this way, with one strongly singled out,
three of medium strength, and six weaker
ones, you achieve an equilibrium, even if
the form is asymmetrical. In cooking, as in
painting, too, it is the principle of seasoning,
a theory of spice, one to three to six, ratios
of notes that achieve an equilibrium of
asymetricalities that paradoxically
proceeds to balance.