Lit from our table
Diamonds of first Spring rain
Make up for the stars
Nature's First Rust
In the unceasing winds
Furls turn tassels then spikes
Feather-like
Become rusty slick drooping hands
Sun gives them their green
Darkening they rise and spread
As oak leaf, a skin far from bone
The density of our own
Thin scarecrow hanging on the fence
He'll get fat this summer

Van Gogh, Beeches
Mansfield
Mass. Beech Tree
We didn't know the tree's name
Only its sweet heaven fragrance
High ridge back of the house
Half my life I drank your waters
Distant lights of town in window
She works at the bright cloth
Aging girl
Spring morning working on the gate
Fleeting rainbow in the West
Quail plump as softballs
Skip to snip the young shoots
Cleaned window to 'Appalachian Spring'
On the floor
A brindled moth
Under cherry tree
The cushion of wet petals
Rained to earth
The downed orchard trees:
Their tips just coming into blossom
Plum blossom petal
Blown by the storm
To my car door
So much life
Herons feeding in the wetland
No more rain today
Grey heron near the cattle
No enmity on the creatures' earth
Pinto herding the kid
Nod once, twice, good--
You're in the goat band now
The llama comically alert
To buttercups across the road
Saxophone meanders soul to soul
Fingertips rest on the cloth threads
Bartok, Satie, our Jewish George
I shut my eyes the blindness is warm
Sounds suffuse and grow
Dust motes rise and fall
The universe of
A morning in June
Seashell ear at the night window
Oh the cricket myriads
SEE-shall
Skate-flies
A lone sparrow
My hand curved in the river:
Early morning
Sunlight in the web
Of my thumb and forefinger
Early morning Tai Chi
For
A Married Couple
1
On the pond two ducks
Drifting together in sleep
Sunlight will wake them
2
Across late sunlight
The speeding birdflock--above
Clouds flying faster
Gwendolyn
The Dog
Brown
eyes big as suns
Still there blinding me
In the West
Little
Richard on Macon Georgia
"When
the rooster crow
And the train go by--
Sleep!--
You done had yo' nightlife!"
Old Memory
Seven Haiku
1
Though asleep
I knew you lay nearby
And touched your side
We were joined once
2
As you slumber
I touch the rib
Formed while you slipped
Soundless from my side
3
As you slumber
I touch the rib
We shared before soundless
You slipped away
4
You sleep
I touch your side
When did you slip
Dreaming
From my heart?
5
Asleep I touch
A perfect form
When did you slip
Dreaming
From my heart?
6
Soundless you slipped
Out my side
In the dark now
The dream is not finished
7
Soundlessly you slipped
Out my side
We sleep floating onward
In the dream

Theban Girl, Photo by Roloff Beny
Rain
Great rain
O great
Great
Rain
The Tao
Life brief
Gods obscure
Nothing still
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