46

beyond the mist

lamp-yellow and new

three willows

three years since

and gone still

you will answer, at times

a delicate question

with such an appearance

where are you now?

beyond the mist

lamp-yellow

and you left us, why?

three willows, lit with young leaves

glowing through a slow white morning

and the kingfisher, low

above the shallow

chattering

there is something worth hunting

on the other side

45

poets are a blight

doing nothing

earning less

passing off assonance

as walls built, or posing 

the calloused, but worldly

gardener  (a vain hedge clipper

) all the while begging each new

flight of topiary nonsense

to speak life and make good

the bowed, selfish shapes

dividing the true road from

those warm yellow

windows

44

gone away,

there are walls

through the woods

where pasture yawned

the soft echo of a different green

lingers in hay fern and moss

gone away, love

the barn between the giant maples

reduced to this square

where the floor was poured too well

the loft, vanished between

those velvet fingers of loss

gone away, love, but

there are walls

running from the brook
to the old road

and so often, when walking here

I mean to sing your name

gone away, love, but still 

I mean to sing 

43

the last island

where the rapids split

elegance and stone

where sycamores rise

mottled gray, the

bones of a writhing valley

that place

all black sand

and

I had a red dog

who on this island

years ago

did long, vicious battle with a coyote

and when it was dead for sure

and buried deep

returned

over and over, to dig up the ribs

its graceful spine

the mask-like, yawning pelvis

and long, sad limbs

forever

we wade the rushing water

to lost islands

and dig

42

so it turns out your fall

was no accident

that nearing the end of the final pitch

you turned, and the beauty below

was greater now than

any above

so you loosened your grip

as we all will, and dropped back

against the deep, wild years

a sweet wind blew across your face

the sun splashed gold

on the endless rock

and that was

that