A tallow worked into a knot
of rawhide, with a ball of waxy light
tied to a stick, the boy

Birds don't sing, they explain. Only human beings sing.

If half the poets in the world stopped writing, there would still be the same amount of poetry.

If ninety-nine percent of the poets in the world stopped writing poetry, there would still be the same amount of poetry.

If you're thinking of going to Syracuse,
   be modest and do not expect
the bronze warriors of Reggio

The Venetian Republic regarded the art of mirror-making as a state secret, to be conserved by any sanction necessary, including the most extreme.

                                  •

Scuola Veneziana, copia di un alfresco perduto, secolo

The sky flashes past us while we sleep,
deep in our beds, drowning,

cello-shaped in our linen sheets,

Nasturtium surplus.
         Water curls and lilies,
lily water. Vermilion and orange

My God, they were all so beautiful,
each parchment trumpeting its cursive praise
of Allah, whose residence m Istanbul

All he could see from this scene over Bluehill, Maine
(no distortions here: the work is from a seagirted light),
is enough of a world for any man, it seems plain

Because I want to watch them do what I would like to do
if I were free, and because it is late and I am tired
and out for what I say is my nightly walk, I stop

There was a time when
his words made me wet with tears:
Ah, our wedding day.