Too brief to be called
A song, yet so distinctive:
What bird can it be?

The       Joyful Feelings       met you as
Yesterday emerged from        the tiny windows
outside Tiffany’s        My rough

Something terrible has happened
but I don’t know what. The letter
that arrived this morning will say no more

Two sharp eminences with a valley between
Through which the erratic witness of a loosened tongue
Flows to the sea: Mount M__________. Mark it well.

I envy them and cannot find
Any comfort in my own uncertainty.

This will be your office, Mr. Blank,
While you remain attached to the Poetry .
Division of the Department of Mediocrity.

All summer long
while other trees
reached for more

One moment the sky is its usual dark,
Dimensionless self, and the next, with a double burst—
Two spreading spheres of radiance, phosphor

Rectangularity controls the setting
Of tables, the organization of paint
On canvas, and the sport of ping-pong.

It's like heaven: you've got to die
To get there. And you can't be sure.
The publisher might go out of business.