Coda
A strong song tows
us, long earsick.
Blind, we follow
rain slant, spray flick
to fields we do not know.
Night, float us.
Offshore wind, shout,
ask the sea
what’ s lost, what’ s left,
what horn sunk,
what crown adrift.
Basil Bunting
from Odes: 15 ["Nothing"]
Nothing
substance utters or time
stills and restrains
joins design and
supple measure deftly
as thought’ s intricate polyphonic
score dovetails with the tread
sensuous things
keep in our consciousness.
Celebrate man’ s craft
and the word spoken in shapeless night, the
sharp tool paring away
waste and the forms
cut out of mystery!
from Odes: 30. The Orotava Road
Four white heifers with sprawling hooves
trundle the waggon.
Its ill-roped crates heavy with fruit sway.
The chisel point of the goad, blue and white,
glitters ahead,
a flame to follow lance-high in a man’ s hand
who does not shave. His linen trousers
like him want washing.