In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

For our house to spring Slowly out ofnight-wet to the sun; beneath us, The moon hacked to pieces on the ground. None but we are curled Here, rising another inch, Knowing that what held us solid in the moon is still With us, where the outside flowers flash In bits, creatures travel Beyond us, like rain, The great sun floats in a fringed bag, all stones quiver With the wind that moves us. We trade laughters silently Back and forth, and feel, As we dreamed we did last night, our noses safe in our fur, That what is happening to us in our dwelling Is true: That on either side As we sleep, as we wake, as we rise Like springs, the house is winding away across the fields, Stopped only momentarily by roads, King-walking hill after hill. Snakebite I am the one And there is no way not To be me not to have been flagged Down from underneath where back Drop ten deadly and Dead pine logs here and where They have fallen. Now come To surprise: Surprise at the dosage at the shot In the foot at the ground Where I walk at what It can do and the ways Falling) .May Day Sermon) and Other Poems / 264 Ofgiving: at dry fish scales That can float away In a long dusty arm Now getting itself frankly lost Swimming against the current Ofpinestraw winging under a stump And a stone. Here is where I am the one chosen: Something has licked my heel Like a surgeon And I have a problem with My right foot and my life. It is hard to think ofdying But not ofkilling: hold the good Foot ready to put on his head Except that it leaves me only On a stage ofpine logs Something like an actor so Let me sit down and draw My tiny sword unfold it Where the dead sharpen needles By the million. It is the role I have been cast in; It calls for blood. Act it out befor~ the wind Blows: unspilt blood Will kill you. Open The new-footed tingling. Cut. Cut deep, as a brother would. Cut to save it. Me. Snakebite / 265 ...

Share