Worldling, by Elizabeth Spires

In a world of souls, I set out to find them.

They who must first find each other,

be each other’s fate.

There, on the open road,

I gazed into each traveler’s face.

Is it you? I would ask.

Are you the ones?

No, no, they said, or said nothing at all.

How many cottages did I pass,

each with a mother, a father,

a firstborn, newly swaddled, crying;

or sitting in its little chair,

dipping a fat wooden spoon

into a steaming bowl,

its mother singing it a foolish song,

One, one, a lily’s my care . . .

Through the seasons I searched,

through years I can’t remember,

reading the lichens and stones

as if one were marked

with my name, my face, my form.

By night and day I searched,

never sleeping, not wanting to fail,

not wanting to simply be a star.

Finally in a town like any other town,

in a house foursquare and shining,

its door wide open to the moon,

did I find them.

There, at the top of the winding stairs,

asleep in the big bed,

the sheets thrown off, curled

like question marks into each other’s arms.

Past memory, I beheld them,

naked, their bodies without flaw.

It is I, I whispered.

I, the nameless one.

And my parents, spent by the dream

of creation, slept on.

From “Worldling” by Elizabeth Spires. (Norton: $18.95; 63 pp.) Copyright 1995 Reprinted by permission.