Published on: 8/4/2005
Night Blessing

for F.

May the moon watch over your bed
lover, while the stars climb the pines
May your dreams be sweet, hot and wild
in the cool calm bowl of the dark

Stay warm, stay warm my love
in that rough pine box of a room-
Over your roof the pines bending
        Stars in their hair
        Stars in their arms

Sleep soft, sleep safe my love
under your blankets half-patched
and half-burnished-

Through your window
the moon stains a radiance
The stars burn like ghost fire
The stars spark like torches

It's a winter night weirdly and wild
        out here,
the frostbit grass aches through
the dew at the roots
of all the standers
in the moss-bearded grove

Bless your warm eyelids, bless your hot cheeks now
Bless the shadows that drift and dress it all--
        Trees
        Grass
        Moon
        Moss
through the reach and the ride of the night

Till the dawn comes pale and climbing
from under the ribbed range of the stars-

Stars like will-o-the-wisps
witnessed
and torches borne
by travellers,
like ghosts in the turning
blue and strange
country of the sky.

Published on: 12/7/2004
Sonnet for Leaves Shaking Light

The breeze makes the leaves shake and shift with light
as morning comes, and a small wind blows the rose
whose petals swam white in the dark last night.
Flower like a ghost, the gold sun leaves those thorns exposed

that last night hid, like a blade wrapped in veils.
I should pick you and give you to my love
who sleeps, still, while I watch you bob and wheel
on morning air, but what would your pale presence prove?

Your ice white against her warm tawny skin
would look like a threat, and all those stiff hooks
would fulfill their promise to catch and cling.
I think I'll let you be a page from last night's book

Of shadows, a note for this morning-time
Poem of light on the maples and pines.