two poets two

two poets two
      ~~~for Stephen

the downstairs poet writes
  ‘sploring  poring over   then pouring out
to the mantra of rain   leaf steady tempo’d
sorting through the con  
  fusions  of too much and too little
picking up and out  stitches  
 needled in  clumsy  
re-stitching life with grace

the upstairs poet  her spinnerets having fiddled
 pupates in her silken rapt chrysalis
  and her threads when she breaks forth
 will connect  part to part
mentation and imagination plied 
 into yarns to be woven in with
 the skein of her skin wrapped spirit

word  as seducer   seduced
 into bearing young
line by line  in suggestive dress
reaching across  empty space
filling it with audibles
song and dance  flung in the face of death
 into the breach  where  the self   whole
 is  questionable  and any Other   veiled
  or  dim in the flaking mirror
 the messenger no longer quicksilver
though s/he speeds in arcs 
across the zodiac
delivery promised  
from what delivered  we are not
privy   this one sentence
 written at large:
you cannot score a perfect
mererly a passing mark
mistakes   of knowing only a piece
x’d in the margins   
no rehearsal  
from what is pieced
a show of only one 
improvised performance
that one though  wondrous
enough