Poetry

After a night of rain like a waterfall, The stony lane that winds up Knocknarea Is a runnel of swift water winding downward. You should wear your Wellingtons and carry a stick. The stones are slippery and the dog at the gate Is fierce and requires a cheerful word in passing. The way up is…

From Boston south he talks of citrus fruit And extra children who pop like extra toes. A good man cuts them off or he makes room. His girlfriend knows that she will never laugh. There is an old man who has lived in shoes, Refinished basements, plastered catacombs Where the cold walls felt like a…

S. P. I say what      mist           may among      pines                      adrift say      what the telling water            leaf to leaf falling      re­            counts      as if in      shorthand as well, too, as what      the mockingbird's piccolo picks out                        repeatedly to                                    keep      in her wet            yet lofty…

for Philip Dow Two hundred waxwings! Swarming on berry bunches like bees to a comb, bats on a cave ceiling. Their greedy thrashes flounced branchlets every which way so the tree looked palsied with panic — or ecstasy? We focused on each soft brown squirm flashing small bursts of wild yellow. Each bird was stemmed…

There was a dance at the black school. In the shot houses people were busy. A woman washed her boy in a basin, sucking a cube of ice to get the cool. The sun drove a man in the ground like a stake. Before his short breath climbed the kitchen's steps She skipped down the…

for C. deGravelles Can you remember when the air just smelled like pine trees, wet dirt, a few flowers? Worlds on worlds still tumble over and this river which was always muddy retains its surface sparkle. But only a fond heart builds immortal faith on a few bright bubbles. Look here: to dig a dirt…

I stare into the glass-paned kitchen door to see a slight girl stuffing fruitcake in her mouth. She jerks with fright. I lean over a tin of World Famous Fruitcake and the world leans out: a woman eats from her cupped hand, over the sink while far away in wonder the aging boy who axe-murdered…

The thick humidity means nothing, my nostalgia even less. The dip and throaty call of goldfinch and oriole, fallen blooms strewn on the ground commemorate the ease of mere detail. But that strong and lingering scent distracts me from the tree-lined road to a saddled mare and her foal taking boys through their paces in…

The road is a hard road,      and the river is wadded and flattened out Due west of Santa Maria dell'Ortolo. Each morning I drove with its steady breathing right to my right, Dawn like a courtier With his high white hat just coming into the room, Ponte Pietra cut in the morning gauze,            …