door to door

maybe all the blues/ requires is a door
Hanif Abdurraqib

i
all the deaths

Think of them going back and back
as far as the eye can see
and all these living breaths
waiting waiting for their
sudden abatements : inexorable
(not) inconsequential
no exceptions
no reprieves
no encores
no amount of money
no gated community
no fame
standing on the edge of the cliff

ii
leaving the cliff : its leap

Ponder the paltry secret of mortality
it looms--a partially opened door
meantime : a plethora of doors
a lifetime of doors : choose a door
front door screen door
back door car door

decisions and indecisions : what's on the other side
the house its rooms
the way out / the way in
looking in or looking out

in the Escher-like labyrinth of never-ending story
urgency and endless coming and going
occasionally recognizing the familiar flights
of stairs / rooms / a door or so
the farther you go the easier it is to get lost

iii
facing the door : which door

the good doors : hope and the future
Ghiberti's Gates of Paradise
its golden story
the gilt of saints and strangers
Old stories and New
a way out : a way in
too many stories : too many strangers

the scary doors : risk and trepidation
Rodin's Gates of Hell
writhing figures melted into bronze
emerging from the door's plane
or from some painful interior
or being sucked inside
a confusion of bodies : the stories a mystery
some thinker presiding over all

iv
to door or not to door

doorless Berlin Wall : now gone
doorless American Wall : going up all around
the winding Great Wall of China : crumbling
where are the doors

a stone rolled before a burial cave
the door at which the virgins wait

the door to the vault : its treasures
padlocked / keyless
no one there
to unlock the door
no one to open the door

Magritte's doors without walls
there is no door

wonder the world its blues its darks
light on the other side
heaven or hell or nothing at all
or matter and energy : to which we all belong