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IV THE DRIVER At the end of the war I arose From my bed in the tent and walked Where the island fell through white stones Until it became the green sea. Into light that dazzled my brain Like the new thought of peace, I walked Until I was swimming and singing. Over the foundered landing craft That took the island, I floated, And then like a thistle came On the deep wind of water to rest Far out, my long legs of shadow downpointing to ground where my soul Could take root and spring as it must. Below me a rusted halftrack Moved in the depths with the movement One sees a thing take through tears Of joy, or terrible sorrow, A thing which in quietness lies Beyond both. Slowly I sank And slid into the driver's shattered seat. Driving through the country of the drowned On a sealed secret-keeping breath, Ten feet under water, I sat still, Getting used to the burning stare Of the wide-eyed dead after battle. I saw, through the sensitive roof— The uneasy, lyrical skin that lies Between death and life, trembling always— An airplane come over, perfectly Helmets 169 Soundless, but could not tell Why I lived, or why I was sitting, With my lungs being shaped like two bells, At the wheel of a craft in a wave Of attack that broke upon coral. "I become pure spirit," I tried To say, in a bright smoke of bubbles, But I was becoming no more Than haunted, for to be so Is to sink out of sight, and to lose The power of speech in the presence Of the dead, with the eyes turning green, And to leap at last for the sky Very nearly too late, where another Leapt and could not break into His breath, where it lay, in battle As in peace, available, secret, Dazzling and huge, filled with sunlight, For thousands of miles on the water. 170 ...

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