White Falls

You see? There is nothing to say there,
White chalk on white walls,
Chalk dust on white hands. The whiteness.
White tongues
Licking white lips. Because underneath
The teeth are showing. If you look

Deeper or shallower than precisely
Skin deep
You will start to see the whiteness, leaching from
The bones, or leaking from
The bleach of the sky.

And if the love is that much stronger
At the same time the words
Will not settle to their task; they scatter,
Pale fish,
The slow white blood
Of the pale world.

Paper white, birch white, darling,
Snow white; white as the hoarse
Cold water of the falls.