Cecilia Woloch
from TSIGAN (THE GYPSY POEM)

We were going by train we were going by plane we were going by
ship by bicyle. We were going on foot we were going in rain we
were going by bridge by car alone.

We were always the same strange
woman with our one black suitcase packed. We were moving in
some kind of subtle direction on a smudged map, dark with crows.
But without compass schedule plans we were losing everything we
passed. We were throwing happiness with both hands to the wind
like ragged clothes.

We looked into the mirror of the road for signs
of god. We were searching for the underground of everywhere at
once. We were often photographed. We were never captured. Not for
long. We were going where the suffering was best to suffer more.
And where the joy was blinding, too.

We were wearing veils beneath
our veils. We were lapping up the world and rusing through it in our sleep.
We were multiple as stars as grass the ghostly barren
trees.

We were a single moving shape: shadow and flesh,
the shape between. I thought I saw you once over my shoulder,
felt you breathe. Someone was panting down the tracks. I ran and ran....