West Wind Read Free

Rapture
    All summer
I wandered the fields
that were thickening
every morning,
    every rainfall,
with weeds and blossoms,
with the long loops
of the shimmering, and the extravagant—
    pale as flames they rose
and fell back,
replete and beautiful—
that was all there was—
    and I too
once or twice, at least,
felt myself rising,
my boots
    touching suddenly the tops of the weeds,
the blue and silky air—
listen,
passion did it,
    called me forth,
addled me,
stripped me clean
then covered me with the cloth of happiness—
    I think
there is no other prize,
only rapture the gleaming,
rapture the illogical the weightless—
    whether it be for the perfect shapeliness
of something you love—
like an old German song—
or of someone—
    or the dark floss of the earth itself,
heavy and electric.
At the edge of sweet sanity open
such wild, blind wings.

Fox
    You don't ever know where
a sentence will take you, depending
on its roll and fold. I was walking
over the dunes when I saw
the red fox asleep under the green
branches of the pine. It flared up
in the sweet order of its being,
the tail that was over the muzzle
lifting in airy amazement
and the fire of the eyes followed
and the pricked ears and the thin
barrel body and the four
athletic legs in their black stockings and it
came to me how the polish of the world changes
everything, I was hot I was cold I was almost
dead of delight. Of course the mind keeps
cool in its hidden palace—yes, the mind takes
a long time, is otherwise occupied than by
happiness, and deep breathing. Still,
at last, it comes too, running
like a wild thing, to be taken
with its twin sister, breath. So I stood
on the pale, peach-colored sand, watching the fox
as it opened like a flower, and I began
softly, to pick among the vast assortment of words
that it should run again and again across the page
that you again and again should shiver with praise.

Gratitude
    I was walking the field,
in the fatness of spring
the field was flooded with water, water stained black,
black from the tissues of leaves, oak mostly,
but also
beech, also
blueberry, bay.
    Then the big hawk rose. In her eyes
I could see how thoroughly she
hated me. And there was her nest, like a round raft
    with three white eggs in it, just
    above the black water.
    ***
    She floats away
climbs the invisible air
on her masculine wings
    then glides back
    agitated responsible
climbs again angry
    does not look at me.
    Halfway to my knees
in the black water
I look up
    I cannot stop looking up
    how much time has passed
I can hardly see her now
    swinging in that blue blaze.
    ***
    There are days when I rise from my desk desolate.
There are days when the field water and the slender grasses
and the wild hawks
have it all over the rest of us
    whether or not they make clear sense, ride the beautiful
long spine of grammar, whether or not they rhyme.

Little Summer Poem Touching the Subject of Faith
    Every summer
I listen and look
under the sun's brass and even
in the moonlight, but I can't hear
    anything, I can't see anything—
not the pale roots digging down, nor the green stalks muscling up,
nor the leaves
deepening their damp pleats,
    nor the tassels making,
nor the shucks, nor the cobs.
And still,
every day,
    the leafy fields
grow taller and thicker—
green gowns lofting up in the night,
showered with silk.
    And so, every summer,
I fail as a witness, seeing nothing—
I am deaf too
to the tick of the leaves,
    the tapping of downwardness from the banyan feet—
all of it
happening
beyond all seeable proof, or hearable hum.
    And, therefore, let the immeasurable come.
Let the unknowable touch the buckle of my spine.
Let the wind turn in the trees,
and the mystery hidden in dirt
    swing through the air.
How could I look at anything in this world
and tremble, and grip my hands over my heart?
What should I fear?
    One morning
in the leafy green ocean
the honeycomb of the corn's beautiful body
is sure to be there.

Dogs
    Over
the