In training    He loves pretending he is
A layer of skin    Peeled from Death's moonburnt

Shoulders    Tonight he is resting under

The romance of the twelve-year-old who finds
Himself behind the school in a stingray,
How he's never the same. I had a friend

My dear, you moved so rapidly through my life
I see you as a ghostly blur;
You are the subject, I the ornament

      They are far from shore.
Foam-glittering , they rise from the waves
      in a pure fountain

It rests on tiny roots, a vision of angles,
And lives long.

It has no passion for gossip and little need for the usual,

There is no longer just the knife, a bundle
                of sticks, and a pot with fire.
            Other things have made their appearance.

I'd seen him scuttling under a parked car
In the oil-stained side street near the auto shop,
Or peering from beneath the juniper bush

I am trying on an especially evil-looking pair of shoes
when the shopgirl points to the middle of her face and says,

"This is called what?" For a moment I draw a blank as I search

A cloche in plum,
In lion marigold,
Or mannish toques; a Borsalino. Bring

Lost souls in Chekhov watch the fireflies emerge
from the woods, haltingly, and mope: "One day we'll know
the reason we have lived and why we have worked