the praises

8/7/2019 The Praises

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The Praises

I

We are borninto the weight

of our bodies.

Our bodies,

unlike birds,

no longer

like water, not

anything like air,take command.

II

The held head

throbs.

Say of it: it

can be contained.

Say of the traveler:

wind owns him.

Say of the sea:

it has shores

and of mountains:

they have summits.

Say of blade-edge: it

can be blunted²of

contemptuous

eye: it can blink.



III

The shining of the thing,

the needle in each detail.A woman

smiles at me.

I smile back,

wishing traffic¶s motion

would somehow mean

what I wanted it to,

somehow carry us further to

what each of us

is.

IV

²to be a part of²

bridge swings over²

dares to proceed.

Hand is not in it;

it is not of the hand.

Stars and they are wrong.

To be in the separation

of sidewalk and asphalt,

of lawn and path;

to find oneself apart

from it, being content

with the barren aspect

of the familiar,

of all that is unseen

in the landscape,

the air, the water.



V

To convergeas cables

from houses converge

under the streetlight

in uniform rain.

To share this street

with strangers,

released by a moment,

by histories, unrealizedin this night.

VI

Not the turn of the wheel

but the wheel turning.

Not the wave against the shore

but a number of waves

against a number of shores.Not the light²

but the light²the pulse

of the light

against the landscape.

the praises

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