The New Vocation Poem by Elizabeth Robinson

The body collects aphorisms, as though it were a jar.
That is the world, secured so, and palely organized
according to mysterious function.
I step forward from the system to confess
that I no longer want to whiten
the mystery. I had once carried
a knife to cut away armloads of list,
wind blowing. But no more this obscurity.
The body was once fair and loved its excess,
a beauty of retrieval. But in so saying, it has
left itself behind, wan,
and partial. The speck called
real shrinks in proportion to the truth
said on it. And a willowy body can apportion
its grace to curve even around so small
a thing as this. Benediction or chastisement.
That is, function and vocation fight,
physically: I lick myself. I apply tongue
to disappearance. Work and works.
Who was it that mentioned the knife. The sharp
pale paint that the tongue distributes.

Function cuts away the wind, and therefore:
resurrection. And did you know the body
was dead? The real, surrounded by its works,
refers back to the clear container. This term, body,
bleached with overuse, but endlessly flexible
claims its vocation is affect. Stored here,
riddle is cheek by jowl with question.
I recruit myself as transparent. The real
and its systems forever abating. The mystery
arouses the blade to its calling.