Diamond

a poem by Aseem Kaul

Line after line
I lose myself
In the sunbeam of the poem
Trying to get the words to reflect you;
I write poetry the way you change faces
Always turning away.

Is this love?
Or only the calcified loneliness
Of a thousand summer nights
Turned suddenly brilliant
Scratching the cut-glass day?

I don’t know.
I know only that the tyranny of your perfection
Betrays me to myself,
Flashing white treason with a promise forever.

How can one fit a pattern to eternity?
I try to look through you
But you diffuse the world.