There was sometime a creature in the wind
who cried and fretted sweet her voice;
she plucked your green felt cap and,
coat and hair, she in her likeness rearranged you;

she ridiculed the leaves
who died of shame for weeks; once those
villagers drew barrels to their ears, they
lost aim rusting in the sun;

to pry, she'd smooth her vegetation,
folding it in sound,
challenging and boasting
while among the variations in her song
an insect council played; in a morning fog
she dozed from lullabies;

cry how fields were shorn, how
on ground her death frosts thick;
where you kept your humor
she has been a pile of stones

for you, your rest: in
a sky left wider than before
the dust is growing deserts and
its quarreling is funereal.

to possess a will can be made like iron
in the heart of a very old sun
I traveled through rings and haze
looking for a tradewind curling boldly
at some horizon whence blind to me
slipped ophidian beneath my feet
a shade—
the philosopher's boot struck face
with a lonely looking sound
and clear annunciation
rattling the deck of a turning sunship