“Make me up,” says Nothing:
It has a certain Shape in Mind²
See with your Eyes Accomplished
That which your Lips have Spoken³
Oh, I Say: this is going to Be – and it Is⁴
Let us be the Shape and Echo of our Word⁵
You, Here – Quickened by the Breath of Names⁶
Facing the Unpredictable Compound that forms
Mysteriously from the elements of our Lips⁷
Look how your Hand Revises my Form⁸
I Accrue what I Hear unto myself and
Let Sounds Contribute toward me⁹
One Lives one’s Life in the Word¹⁰
¹ Paul Tran, Incident Report
² Rae Armantrout, Incorporation
³ The Epic of Gilgamesh tr. N.K. Sandars
⁴ Mary Ruefle, Genesis
⁵ William Faulkner, As I Lay Dying
⁶ Paul Celan tr. Pierre Joris, Slate-Eyed One
⁷ F. Scott Fitzgerald, Winter Dreams
⁸ Claire Schwartz, Where I Eat
⁹ Walt Whitman, Song of Myself
¹⁰ Charles Wright, Lost Language