AUTUMN
To go towards winter
Is to
Travel
On a road of noise,
Cold noise
Becoming colder and silent.
Cold noise
Comes in sentences
With a surplus of commas.
The road is bumpy,
Has no ruts,
Erases the prints of foottracks..and fingers.
Noise wears an asphalt crown.
THE CRADLE OF WIND
Orioles among oranges
Swing
The cradle
That dropped from the sky.
The cradle was dropped by a star.
The cradle is woven out of wind.
The cradle
Is swung
Slowly
By Orioles.
The cradle is empty.
HIGH STONE WALL
Behind the tall stone wall,
A rose
Of water
That I desire,
A flower
With fish
For petals,
A flower
Whose one eye
Is blue,
A flower
With fins
For teeth.
A flower I desire,
But will never
Touch.
THE COLLECTOR
The butterfly collector
Has lost
His silver sacks of pins.
The butterfly collector
Cannot find
His paper bag of silver nails.
His net was stolen
By a water nymph
Whose hair was all light.
Butterflies fly freely,
Their wings comb
The nymph's hair.
THE CARPENTER
Bacchus builds bleachers,
Nymphs
Sit in rows,
Watch
Pink wine do pirouettes,
Red wine dance a saraband,
White wine
Play a flute made from a cedar
While leaping over bayberry bushes.