逸影萍踪

Am I Not Among the Early Risers

Am I not among the early risers

and the long-distance walkers?

Have I not stood, amazed, as I consider

the perfection of the morning star

above the peaks of the houses,
and the crowns of the trees

blue in the first light?

Do I not see how the trees tremble, as though

sheets of water flowed over them

though it is only wind, that common thing,

free to everyone, and everything?

Have I not thought, for years, what it would be

worthy to do, and then gone off,
barefoot and with a silver pail,

to gather blueberries,

thus coming, as I think, upon a right answer?

What will ambition do for me that the fox,
appearing suddenly

at the top of the field,

her eyes sharp and confident
as she stared into mine,

has not already done?

What countries, what visitations,

what pomp would satisfy me
as thoroughly as Blackwater Woods

on a sun-filled morning,
or, equally, in the rain?

Here is an amazement–––
once I was twenty years old and in

every motion of my body
there was a delicious ease,

and in every motion of the green earth
there was a hint of paradise,

and now I am sixty years old,
and it is the same.

Above the modest house and the palace
–––the same darkness.

Above the evil man and the just,
the same stars.

Above the child who will recover
and the child who will not recover,
the same energies roll forward,

from one tragedy to the next and
from one foolishness to the next.

I bow down.

Have I not loved as though
the beloved could vanish at any moment ,

or become preoccupied,
or whisper a name other than mine

in the stretched curvatures of lust,
or over the dinner table?

Have I ever taken good fortune for granted?

Have I not, every spring,
befriended the swarm that pours forth?

Have I not summoned the honey-man to come,
to hurry, to bring with him
the white and comfortable hive?

And while I waited,
have I not leaned close, to see everything?

Have I not been stung
as I watched their milling and gleaming,

and stung hard?

Have I not been ready always at the iron door,

not knowing to what country it opens
–––to death or to more life?

Have I ever said that the day was too hot or too cold

or the night too long and as black as oil anyway,

or the morning, washed blue and emptied entirely

of the second-rate, less than happiness

as I stepped down from the porch and set out along

the green paths of the world?