In the British museum we were asphyxiated by the Korean exhibits.

It was from our laughter that echoed off the glass
and worked within us
the same way those seemingly prehensile pictograms
reach out their branches for you
and constrict what they can.

in reality the characters are neat, regular
perfectly contained in each
little white square, black strokes
twisting into the white paper.

there is some new mystery in that structured darkness,
a prescribed nothing. what made the most impression on me
was the temple, reconstructed as a skeleton, joints held brittle
with glass. it surrounded me like the transparent guarantee of a prayer;
far off some same smoke twisted a joy for me.

I am somewhere else now.
those winding things got into my veins
and I am not coming back.