Against the Evidence: Selected Poems, 1934–1994

Three in Transition

An Ontology In the dark I step out ofbed and approaching the kitchen down the foyer run my hand over the wall, smooth and rough by turns, with cracks, holes, lumps and dips the whole length, my hand forming to each. The floor bumpy and creaking, now straight and now sagging, the soles of my feet shape to each change. My shoulders compress to the narrow hallway as they go forward with me to the kitchen, and there my eyes blink at the light. Because I can find no direction of my own, I eat. I belong with the bread, the milk and the cheese. I become their peace. I am nourished with myself and go back to bed. I become the mattress, I lie upon myself, I close my eyes, I become sleep. It rolls me over as I dream. I become a lack of control, happening simultaneously everywhere. It is me, I am happening. As I move all moves with me. I am this all as it moves and harm cannot come unless I happen, but because I exist, I am existence. Three in Transition For wcw I wish I understood the beauty in leaves falling. To whom are we beautiful as we go? 72 I Poems of the 1960s I lie in the field still, absorbing the stars and silently throwing off their presence. Silently I breathe and die by turns. He was ripe and fell to the ground from a bough out where the wind is free of the branches For My Daughter in Reply to a Question We're not going to die, we'll find a way. We'll breathe deeply and eat carefully. We'll think always on life. There'll be no fading for you or for me. We'll be the first and we'll not laugh at ourselves ever and your children will be mygrandchildren. Nothing will have changed except by addition. There'll never be another as you and never another as I. No one ever will confuse you nor confuse me with another. We will not be forgotten and passed over and buried under the births and deaths to come. 73 ...