Zk | notes

The seasonal storms have poured upon the grassy flat, The leafless stalks abound like thirsty mouths. Puddles form and soon are swarmed with little fish, And all the arid life has fled despair. And here, wrapped in rain, lies the oldest soul, The changes wrack his bones with painful cold. His skin is like the sky at night, as many scars Have marked his hide as there are glinting stars. At once he feels his lungs become bereft of breath, His daughter nudges him, to no effect. She walks away rememb’ring days they stalked the plains, Within her womb there grows a golden bloom.

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Summer, season of hot insomnia, That much never seems to change at all. Laying awake in the red desert night, I shape forest from shade and wait for fall. Ten years now gone, and who thought I would miss Cricket songs, cicadas and katydids? Then I’d gladly have grabbed a big hammer, Smashed them flat as Pinocchio’s conscience. Testing palisades of clocks and yardsticks, No advent waits for the restive dreamer. I bandage my tattered, bitten left hand And shed the smoke rings on my cloven finger.

We crawl through moist humus like millipedes, Feasting on dirt and dead, crumbling leaves While striped skies cycle through violet hues, While time’s kisses take the shape of a bruise. Endeavors wear the warmer years away, Reduced at last to heaven’s dormant clay. Alive, I lick brambles until my tongue Tears, despairing ever being so young. I think of you. I don’t smile when I do. A moment more and then the day is gone, In evening grey, we mourn the vanished dawn, And so on, maybe waiting for someone To come drag us back to where we belong. In dreams we interred, with your pure throat bare, I know your breath, your jasmine-scented air. Alive, a god to mites and mud-daubers. The harvestmen scuttle and bob onwards.

My garden of foxtails and milk-thistle, Alive and wild, more so than tended rows In growth, has died. I killed them a little, The crab-grass clumps, Datura and nettle. “Time and time, I commit these small murders, To whose benefit?” I ask why and wonder, The scent of sap on scuffed and bloody hands. If I indwelt some luring scrap of land Far from here, secluded, my own to call, I would welcome these same weeds, one and all, To plant their roots in my warm, earthen roof, Just they and I, with no need of reproof, And thank the thorns for making a hale fence, The compost for being my winter blanket.

I. The snow is falling, sleeping, whispering, dreaming of water. II. Gold, silver, iron, stone; pure and gentle, silently melting, the sun sings softly through the quiet ice. III. A single snowflake awakens, shimmers, glows, watches the world with weary eyes, darkens, settles, and disappears.

Lament for Pasiphaë pg.206 Dying sun, shine warm a little longer! My eye, dazzled with tears, shall dazzle yours Conjuring you to shine and not to move You, sun, and I all afternoon have laboured Beneath a dewless and oppressive cloud– A fleece now gilded with our commen grief That this must be a night without a moon Dying sun, shine warm a little longer! Faithless she was not: she was very woman Smiling with dire impartiality Sovereign, with heart unmatched, adored of men Until Spring’s cuckoo with bedraggled plumes Tempted her pity and her truth betrayed Then she who shone for all resigned her being And this must be a night without a moon Dying sun, shine warm a little longer! Like Snow pg.143 She, then, like snow in a dark night Fell secretly. And the world waked With dazzling of the drowsy eye So that some muttered ‘Too much light,’ And drew the curtains close Like snow, warmer than fingers feared And to soil friendly; Holding the histories of the night In yet unmelted tracks She Tells Her Love While Half Asleep pg.173 She tells her love while half asleep In the dark hours With half-words whispered low: As Earth stirs in her winter sleep And puts out grass and flowers Despite the snow Despite the falling snow Mid-Winter Waking pg.165 Stirring suddenly from long hibernation I knew myself once more a poet Guarded by timeless principalities Against the worm of death, this hillside haunting; And presently dared open both my eyes O gracious, lofty, shone against from under Back-of-the-mind-far clouds like towers; And you, sudden warm airs that blow Before the expected season of new blossom While sheep still gnaw at roots and lambless go– Be witness that on waking, this mid-winter I found her hand in mine laid closely Who shall watch out the Spring with me We stared in silence all around us But found no winter anywhere to see Intercession in Late October Poetry vol.71 no.1 - October 1947 - pg.23 - https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/browse?contentId=24836 How hard the year dies: no frost yet On drifts of yellow sand Midas reclines Fearless of moaning reed or sullen wave Firm and fragrant still the brambleberries On ivy-bloom butterflies wag Spare him a little longer, Crone For his clean hands and love-submissive heart

Heedless that the dews mark the passing of our day — we bind ourselves to others (Mi no ue no tsuyu to mo shirade hodashikeri - p.11 - spring) O winds of autumn! Nearer we draw to the Buddha As the years advance (Akikaze yo hotoke ni chikaki toshi no hodo - p.11 - autumn) Floating weeds, as blow the winds of the floating world — drifting and drifting (Ukigusa ya ukiyo no kaze no iu mama ni - p.18 - spring) A blessing indeed — This snow on the bed-quilt, This, too, is from the pure land (Arigata ya fusama no yuki mo Jodo yori - p.46 - winter) Is this it, then, My last resting place — Five feet of snow! (Kore ga maa tsui no sumika ka yuki goshaku - p.37 - winter) On the hill of summer Stands the slender maiden flower In a solitary humor (Natsuyama ya / Hitori kigen no / Ominaeshi - p.65 - summer) Red dragon-fly — He’s the one that likes the evening, Or so it seems. (Akatombo / Kare mo yubo ga / Suki ja yara - p.65 - autumn) Heedless that the tolling bell Marks our own closing day — We take this evening’s cool (Mi no ue no kane tomo shirade yusuzumi - p.39 - summer)

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun; Conspiring with him how to load and bless With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run; To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees, And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core; To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells With a sweet kernel; to set budding more, And still more, later flowers for the bees, Until they think warm days will never cease, For Summer has o’er-brimm’d their clammy cells.