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There is at times a small fire
In the brain, partita for violin,
Brier, black stem,
All burning in the quarter notes.
And the hedgerow
Beyond the barn
Calls its starlings in.
Then frost, sere leaves,
A swollen half-moon
Like a drowsy fingertip
Above the apple trees.
From Only Bread, Only Light (Copper Canyon Press, 2000). Copyright © 2000 by Stephen Kuusisto. Used with the permission of the author.
14.
Old baseball glove,
toy of the blind kid.
Who sniffed its oiled leather,
who could not use it.
Sometimes he’d cry into it.
Do you understand that dark joy?
15.
The raven stood in a baby carriage and croaked to passersby. Her voice was a purple softness, really not much.
Something about a dingy bird is a question—where shall we work and live—or how did it come to this, a thing called “in public” standing near the ocean among balloons and pies?
Where did the baby vanish to?
A breeze rides in with its assignment. A woman laughs because she thinks she’s partly immortal.
At times the blind see light,
And that moment is the Sistine ceiling,
Grace among buildings—no one asks
For it, no one asks.
After all, this is solitude,
Daylight’s finger,
Blake’s angel
Parting willow leaves.
I should know better.
Get with the business
Of walking the lovely, satisfied,
Indifferent weather—
Bread baking
On Arthur Avenue
This first warm day of June.
I stand on the corner
For priceless seconds.
Now everything to me falls shadow.