They Will Sew the Blue Sail

UNDERLINE | Keith Waldrop

after some

while, to

persuade himself

as the snows

pile

all things, he

thinks

think, by some

mortal link

fine particles, bright

sound in

air, loud surface

of sea, still

groans from the

ground

all this he hears

and it endears

to him the silence of the spheres

raises his

fist, lets

go, wrist

over face

light bent just

so, into figures of

common sight

white cloud and

thunder, under

rowdy skies, day

swallowed up

dusk

dark

sun–

rise (all these he sees

no farther up than the leaves

of trees)

immediate

questions, failures

successes

doubts and opinions

clashes, caresses, dry

bones, dry

bones talking on

telephones

moats

filled with

rubbish and roly–

polies, Jesus Christ beside

Pompey in the Holy–

of–Holies

no Lord in this

devil of a

rain, hailstones hacking

valleys out of plain

a thousand years, sadder

and sadder, where

appetite

mounts a

ladder

of

rock

river, sky

air

well enough

placed

edges inter–

faced, the old trite

story:

memento mori

straining to

follow dis–

appearing light

his eyes ablaze with

night