Poems, 1957–1967

DARK ONES

DARK ONES We in all lights are coming Home transfixed and carried away From where we work: when the sun moves down The railroad tracks, and dies a little way Off in the weeds, lights we have made come on And carry us : this is how We are coming, O all Our dark ones, our darlings. Now we float down from aircraft From trains now at our car Lights the doors of our home Garage spring open we enter and fall Down in our souls to pray for light To fail: fail pleasantly with gin, With problems of children but fail fade Back into our tinted walls: Let the airports carry it all night Let the highways support it on their poles Shining on beer cans rolling drunk in the weeds After their one fearful bounce : Lord, let those lights give up On us : office lights, cast like shade On fire, from their banks of blue sticks: A light like the mange, on papers, On the heads emerging from scratch pads, Those crammed, volcanic faces Dreadful to see. All those are creatures Of light. Let them leave me let all 272 Human switches be finally snapped Off at once let me go with my dark Darling, into myself: O let there be Someone in it with me: Let us move everything Off us, and lie touching With all we have. O creature Of darkness, let us lie stretched out Without shadow or weight. Fasten your hand where my heart Would burst, if I moved From your side. You are Who holds. Hold then hold my heart Down from bursting Into light: hold it still and at rest In the center of walls That cannot get their colors Back without light: O Glory, there is nothing Yet at the sill no grain or thread Of sun no light as the heart Beats, feeding from your hand. Falling 273 ...