“Architect’s Watercolor,” a Poem by Arthur Sze

Architect’s Watercolor

An architect draws a watercolor
depicting two people about to
enter a meeting room, while
someone
on the stairway gazes through windows

at a park, river, skyscrapers
beyond; he does not want to be
locked
like a carbon atom in a benzene
ring but needs to rotate, lift off,

veer along wharves and
shoreline. In the acoustics of
this space,
he catches a needle bounce
off a black granite floor, wanders

from a main walkway, encounters
prickly pear burned purple in wind.
In the ocean gusts before dawn,
he yearns for a Mediterranean spray

where sunlight tingles eyelashes,
where sand releases heat
under the stars. In the atrium,
two violinists launch fireworks

of sound that arc, explode, dissolve
into threads of melodic charm.
Here slate near a pool of water
absorbs sunlight, releases ripples

into the evening; and in this space,
each minute is encounter:
he steps out and makes
footprints on a sidewalk dusted with snow.

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Into the Hush by Arthur Sze is available via Copper Canyon Press.