A Dozen Finches
A dozen finches
in unison
dip down,
tilt their wings,
swing up,
sink to their
chosen inch
of branch, and
settle, neat
and silent in
their arrival,
intent upon
that courtesy
that marks the
nearly weightless,
careful with
the imposition
of their half ounces.
Boats
You’ve seen
the tide of time
lift up a thing,
then put it back.
Anything will
briefly float—
a shoe, a hat, a
cut of coat.
Words too,
it is annoying
to note, enjoy
an unearned
buoyancy,
sometimes for
years on end.
As if we rode
the wine-dark sea
in worthy ships
our little boats
contend.
Domino Theory
One domino—stood
up again—can do
incalculable good.
Where doesn’t
much matter. The
blackest water
can unscale
from the center.
Pry up one tile
from the terrible
Dragon Tail River
and it’s utterly
altered: mail
undone to meadow
one way, woods
the other.
It Cannot Be Said for Certain
It cannot be
said for certain
that imagining
a pattern is
self-flattery.
Our acts could
matter. At some
unfathomed distance
the random
could condense
to something—say
a fork—against
the velvet dark.
The silver shiver
that we get from
time to time
somewhere adding
up to silver. The
vacancies we suffer
the necessary black
between the tines.
Finish
The grape and plum
might be said to
tarnish when ripe,
developing some
sort of light dust
on their finish
which the least
touch disrupts.
It is this that
the great Dutch
still lifes catch,
the brush as
much in love
with talc as
with polish.
Also with the
strange seeing-in
you notice when
a bruise mars
a fruit’s surface.
Easter Island
The people of the island built those amazing stone statues, and in the process cut down every last tree. No trees, no wood for houses and fires; no protection from erosion; no useful species, and so on.
—Jon Carroll, San Francisco Chronicle
It worked without
a hitch: the last
big head rolled
down the last logs
to its niche.
As planned,
a long chorus
of monoliths
had replaced
the forest, staring
seaward, nicely
spaced, each with
a generous collar
of greensward,
and prepared to
stand so long
that it would be
a good trade: life,
for the thing made.
