For why am I afraid to sing
the fundamental shape of awe
should I now begin to sing the silvered back of
the winter willow spear
the sparkling agate blue
would this blade and this sky free me to speak
intransitive lack –
the vowels themselves free
Of what am I afraid
of what lies in back of me of day
these stars scattered as far as the I
what world and wherefore
will it shake free
why now in the mind of an afternoon is a daisy
for a while
flagrant and alive
Then what of night
of hours’ unpredicated bad luck and the rot
it clings to
fathomless on the far side in winter dark
Hey shadow world when a thing comes back
comes back unseen but felt and no longer itself
what then
what silver world mirrors tarnished lenses
what fortune what fate
and the forms not themselves but only itself the sky
by water and wind shaken
I am born in silvered dark
Of what am I to see these things between myself
and nothing
between the curtain and the stain
between the hypostatic scenes of breathing
and becoming the thing I see
are they not the same
Things don’ t look good on the street today
beside a tower in a rusting lot
one is a condition the other mystery
even this afternoon light so kind and nourishing
a towering absence vibrating air
Shake and I see pots from old shake
and I see cities anew
I see robes shake I see desert
I see the farthing in us all the ghost of day
the day inside night as tones decay
and border air
it is the old songs and the present wind I sing
and say I love the unknown sound in a word
Mother where from did you leave me on the sleeve
of a dying word
of impish laughter in the midst my joy
I compel and confess open form
my cracked hinged picture doubled
I can’ t remember now if I made a pact with the devil
when I was young
when I was high
on a sidewalk I hear “buy a sweatshirt?” and think
buy a shirt from the sweat of children
hell
I’ m just taking a walk in the sun in a poem
and this sound
caught in the most recent coup