The Rescuer

It's not the myth that frightens me—
these delicate, white moths
as precursors of death.  It is the way
the light around the candle's flame
invites the darkness.  It asks
for the shadow of their wings
as if radiance were too difficult,
a state of perfection.

Tonight their shadows fall
on the porch light.  When I switch it off
they fly into the dark in search
of another source of light.
Someone is turning to face a window now,
unaware of the sound of wings.



Parallax

Here is where we part.
Without question,

you continue your
same, sure pace

into the dark,
its walls a comfort.

Now, alone in this
difficult light, I am

The Rescuer

It's not the myth that frightens me—
these delicate, white moths
as precursors of death.  It is the way
the light around the candle's flame
invites the darkness.  It asks
for the shadow of their wings
as if radiance were too difficult,
a state of perfection.

Tonight their shadows fall
on the porch light.  When I switch it off
they fly into the dark in search
of another source of light.
Someone is turning to face a window now,
unaware of the sound of wings.



Parallax

Here is where we part.
Without question,

you continue your
same, sure pace

into the dark,
its walls a comfort.

Now, alone in this
difficult light, I am

without familiar boundaries.
In the distance

ivy adheres to a wall,
an insistent cover

of green, a mirage
of protection.

How long did you think
I'd walk beside you,

providing a shadow?
I lean into mine

as if it were water.
Each movement changes

the shade's configuration.
How we fed

each other's hunger
for the dark.



Against the Quotidian
(based on Jean Cocteau's film, Orphee)

Death calls him from the mirror.
Men cannot reach her unless
they die.  But he is a poet.

The mirror is only a mirror
until he believes.  He puts on his gloves.
Hands first, he passes through the glass.

And they are lovers.  Mortal, he longs for
what he doesn't have—Eurydice, her flesh.

He wants both women, but Death
persuades him to choose.

You know the rest.  He's not to look back.
Death watches him turn, the mirror
reflecting the fatal gesture.

Orpheus stands alone on the other side.

He steps from the mirror to the window,
climbs in.  Eurydice is dead.
All is useless.  He pushes
against a wall of glass,
the void unbearable as a blank page
on which no words assemble.



Sextant

We walked the pebbled beach
in Suffolk.  You pointed to a signpost
ahead of us.  Minsmere.

Because I'd turned away
or because the gulls' cries filled the air
I heard "wind's mirror."

But the wind is not vain.  It doesn't search
the window of the sea for its reflection,
existing in what it moves—

the boats drifting from their towlines,
the empty nets.
The wind blows your hair

as you walk against blue secting blue.
An instrument, a meridian, you mark
the distance between us and the stars.



Picking Cherries with Another Woman Who Has Been Reading Anais Nin
(after Robert Hass)

Summer.  Dried mud glazes the road.
Ahead of the car—the orchard,
its horizon of barbed wire.

We park along the ditch,
find the gate locked.
Lisa, not giving up, tosses a pail
between the lines, crawls under
the fence and I follow.

After we fill the pails I climb
to reach the higher branches,
shaking cherries into her skirt.

Birds wait on the wires for us to leave.
At the base of the tree: a dead sparrow.
Lisa runs back to the car,
her skirt stained red,
cradles herself in the bucket seat.



Rook       
(location:  Ronalds Street, Iowa City)

I'm raking leaves,
    small twigs and branches.
    A rusted spoon, a piece of blue glass.

Five crows fly toward the house.
    One settles on the roof; the others
    circle the yard, their wings blue-black

as ashes, the same crows who live in the graveyard
    four blocks away.  I've watched them
    high in the pine trees there,

how they circle, naming the stones.
    Ancient Chinese symbols portray crows' legs
    (or wings?) to look like branches

without leaves, a pictograph read two ways—
    in front of the sun, the bird is auspicious.
    If the bird stands alone, it is not.

And that bird—why doesn't it fly away
    with the others?
    The sky is overcast.

The crow is standing like a weathervane,
    each eye a window
    with a separate view.

I was told that crows could be taught to talk.
    If I put a word
    on its tongue

I could change my luck.  "Black bird,
    you love shiny things.
    This ring.  See how it catches the light."

But my crow joins the others when it's called
    to the air.  They fly across rooftops,
    the trees, their limbs written as birds' wings,

connecting two worlds: one where I stand
    without a shadow.
    The crows disappear into the other.