sometimes the
sky has
more blue than I can believe
After the rain
interrupting our afternoon
/ the woods
floats off a thin smell
like a new day
You know you must tell her
and you are resolved;
you have composed the sentences carefully
and you’ve practiced them
but she’ll not help you
will not let you know
she knows
The thing about mountains
that from so far away
you can see where you’re going
Closer
everything changes / you
can see
only where you’ve been
FALL
Afternoon
a slanted light
as on a warm October
all you are
pursuing
something vague of apples
ready growth and still
green bracken a jay
and the first blue haze
juicy with sleep
weight of leaves
a sadness something
long awaited
Fire must have
an edge to cling to
a place
to spread its forces
a spot
to work away from
The duck
wilted in the boat
blood in the bilge
neck strangely twisted
the eye a puncture in flowers
Burn it
burn it all and start again
with less collusion
Each leaf bends into itself
tumbles down and back / spinning
down and back on itself
married to its falling
Again frost presses
its patterns
silver fossils on the window
I try seeing beyond
the night is nothing
a background
design of creatures
that never die
For Basil Bunting
He’s making something
as a mason piling stone on stone
setting the plan before him
A man passes in the street
he lifts his eyes from the page
to see how he passes
to have been there
and gone on
A foot falls
the frame moves
the moment endures
The mason’s trowel
makes rhythm with the mud
laying it on
selecting the stone
Poem to Be Given a Seafaring Title at a Later Date
Falling off from here
a few points
to catch a better wind
and beat the storm
to the breakwater
then turning south
before the wind
running free to a safe harbor
one we can make in this weather
riding crests in a following sea
plunge of bow
deep in the trough and the sweep
of white water down the decks
mast creaking and all lines taut
we hold and sway
carried on the storm that threatens us
Someone is signaling from the beach
the
