i.
The wind singes
the round, brown earth. The wind lashes the long
jets. The wind blows through
the sycamores, and through the bodies of the sparrows,
and through our bodies. The wind becomes
humble and bows to us
where we are hallow I stoop to kiss all of their knees,
one after one;
until the rinds fall away from their bellies and eyes, until
the rinds fall away from the clocks and from the food and from the humming of the flies.
I bend to kiss their all ten sad knees like leaves
poised on the water, their faces
small and near to the stars; poised
on their knees as poising on ash, as sacrifice
poises its mouth and opens and speaks a new language and says no thing,
but sounds a silence in our bodies, like the light
which falls away, the sparrows at work
dropping their dark cloth. The sparrows and their wind carrying
the cloth from singed tree to singed tree.



ii.
And the scent of olives
across the wind, and the grapes
against the children's
tongues, and the tall
men in their hats
getting caught in the dark air
like getting caught in sinew,
and bone.
And splintered bone.

06/29/2005

Posted on 06/29/2005
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