I fell in love with the Siberian Iris
In the garden catalog,
Slender-stemmed, indigo shading to violet,

As in the plays, the body was decor,
Fit embellishment to a scene
Where chance's misrule seemed to have gone as planned:

It is all death, right from the start,
That fluttering agitation in the violins.
Even the love duet, by nightfall

It began with the deer, dead in the water 
Just off my parents’ dock, 
And then there was a procession of horses,

But in the stippled, rose velvet
Buds of staghorn sumac, in rust-
  Bright veins of briar,

In a nearly empty off-season cafe, just across
From the row of grand Saratoga hotels, I lost faith
In the elegance of the facades fronting Congress Park,