The Bowl Filling

I didn’t follow the holy man around
I never sat down to a meal with him

Loving him began this way: water
poured into emptiness
the bowl filling

Until I lifted the rim to my lips, drank
drank until action passed
into consequence, until the story was taken up
by those who think memory belongs
to the past, not to the future

We each had our parts—he
and I and the water—
and then the others, the ones
of dry hands and kisses
the ones on whom the plot depended