Far-Off Settlements

Their burning, hot-branded outlines, their inner pathways, are all a psalm
sung sad and monotonous;
children run and yell
like little blips, in never-ending quiet,
demented sepia. And there are also cities
which can make this sun’s light sweet:
In their dusky golden looking-glasses, water breaks, and lights up
those gathered sweet smells and old caresses; in the warm bathing-places:
the laughter, the walls turning green now once again.
–Their temples sip from the seas.

Ghostly city limits, wavering (The caravans, the strong south winds, the
over-arching nights with no-one there, the long afternoons –
what separates all these are the untrodden sands), mirages, echoes that
cloud them,
that connect them;
a sly wet lick of salt in the corners of the mouth;
And this resonance, called forth.