This Morning

Enter without knocking, hard-working ant.

I'm just sitting here mulling over

What to do this dark, overcast day?

It was a night of the radio turned down low,

Fitful sleep, vague, troubling dreams.

I woke up lovesick and confused.

I thought I heard Estella in the garden singing

And some bird answering her,

But it was the rain. Dark tree tops swaying

And whispering. "Come to me my desire,"

I said. And she came to me by and by,

Her breath smelling of mint, her tongue

Wetting my cheek, and then she vanished.

Slowly day came, a gray streak of daylight

To bathe my hands and face in.

Hours passed, and then you crawled

Under the door, and stopped before me.

You visit the same tailors the mourners do,

Mr. Ant. I like the silence between us,

The quiet--that holy state even the rain

Knows about. Listen to her begin to fall,

As if with eyes closed,

Muting each drop in her wild-beating heart.