In the Woods

Hooked by a jangle in the high periphery
my gaze flowed up, tracking birch, white chalk,
foam breakers on a sea of rolling pine,
to a syncopated chaos of limbs
tempered by the improbable sway
of ancient wind-beaters.

For a moment, communion.
I sensed alignment, the drift, the steadier heartbeat;
the thrashing leaves in light-dark morse
woke ganglia, joined the surging of capillaries.
For a moment, I rolled
with the fluid perfection of that sea.

A fly chose that instant
to ambush my ear
with foghorn finesse.
I think it’s still lodged there.

 

June ’00

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