When I was one and twenty
and full of beauty, hate
and arrogance, we tripped

She grabs my necked with ringed fingers and bites
my cheek. A seaman hands her a bottle,

In the sea he’s drinking bourbon,
hoping to give himself up to the birds

Foreshortened, that web of flesh spanning
knuckle to thumb, meek allower of
opposition, loose and fragile in

That which rings and spins, that which is broken
and between, lingers behind the curtain. We were
a family business: My father, top and tails, sawing

A slender plank above a waterhole,
planted on end to meet my wants,
I hear its whisper in the stock.

Eastern Sea, 100 fathoms,
green sands, pebbles,
broken shells.

Jesus wrote in the sand.
I write in red notebooks. . . .

After grace and after rain,

If a man walks with one hand on the baby carriage
As he argues with the mother but picks blossoms
From the park trees to fold into the carriage

Ardea Candidissima, snowy
Heron or White
Egret, printed London 1835, not