Under
the Maud Moon
1
On
the Path,
by
this wet site
of
old fires -
black
ashes, black stones, where tramps
must
have squatted down,
gnawing
on stream water,
unhouseling
themselves on cursed bread,
failing
to get warm at a twigfire -
I
stop,
gather
wet wood, and for her,
whose
face
I
held in my hands
a
few hours, whom I gave back
only
to keep holding the space where she was,
I
light
a
small fire in the rain.
The
black
wood
reddens, the deathwatches inside
begin
running out of time, I can see
the
dead, crossed limbs
longing
again for the universe, I can hear
in
the wet wood the snap
and
re-snap of the same embrace being torn.
The
raindrops trying
to
put the fire out
fall
into it and are
changed:
the oath broken,
the
oath sworn between earth and water, flesh and spirit, broken,
to
be sworn again,
over
and over, in the clouds, and to be broken again,
over
and over, on earth.
-Galway
Kinnell
©
1971 The Book of Nightmares |