the thickening mist, and is gone.
As soon as we step out, the cold stings.
The street seems hardened or tightened.
Space recedes in shrunken perspectives.
Instinct impels us, or habit, to pull in our heads,
and hunch our shoulders, to gather ourselves
together and offer less hold to the glacial air.
We hear nothing but the crunch of our footsteps.
An occasional car passes, underscoring
the perfect silence weâre listening to.
Hard to explain what weâre doing outdoors
in this weather, at this hour, absolutely outdoors,
and thereâs no one to ask the question.
In the vastness of a hospital parking lot (this is indeed what
the moon would be like, were we on it, quintessential suburb,
suburb of the earth), a crow alights on a lamppost
and loudly salutes the ten-thirty sunlight in its multiple
reflections on the hoods, the bumpers and the chrome.
Near the emergency entrance, ambulance attendants
smoke and gossip in the chilly air. They survey
the steppe of cars that theyâve seen so often.
A few patients shepherded by family, old people
or walking like old people, shuffle very slowly away
under the monumental sky. An ambulance wheels in,
lights whirling and flashing. The crow flies off.
Youâve got to tear up these drafts youâve copied,
which are nothing now but the sum of the errors
and approximations that youâve tried to correct,
although itâs not without pleasure that you view the design
of crossings out, arrows, circlings, additions, scrawls
of blue or red or black ink, plus some underlinings
you donât remember making. For what purpose
do you study your mindâs mess here, the random
chance that you tried to winâin vain, donât you see?
You were hoping for one true word thatâs neither here,
nor in those clean copies you slide into a folder andâ
in their placeâthe just-about of your abilities.
I have built up a monument as fragile as the grass,
as unstable as the daylight, as fleeting as the air, and
as fluid as the rain we see running in the streets.
Iâve consigned it to paper that will dry, and
which may burn, or be splotched by the damp
with a bloom of pink, or green, or grey mildew,
and give off a pungent earthy odour. Iâve worked
in the transient substance of a tongue that will
cease to be spoken, sooner or later, or be pronounced
some other way, forming other words to convey
other thoughts. Iâve pledged it to the oblivion certain
to enfold all that this day bathes in its sweetness.
As soon as we step out, the cold stings.
The street seems hardened or tightened.
Space recedes in shrunken perspectives.
Instinct impels us, or habit, to pull in our heads,
and hunch our shoulders, to gather ourselves
together and offer less hold to the glacial air.
We hear nothing but the crunch of our footsteps.
An occasional car passes, underscoring
the perfect silence weâre listening to.
Hard to explain what weâre doing outdoors
in this weather, at this hour, absolutely outdoors,
and thereâs no one to ask the question.
In the vastness of a hospital parking lot (this is indeed what
the moon would be like, were we on it, quintessential suburb,
suburb of the earth), a crow alights on a lamppost
and loudly salutes the ten-thirty sunlight in its multiple
reflections on the hoods, the bumpers and the chrome.
Near the emergency entrance, ambulance attendants
smoke and gossip in the chilly air. They survey
the steppe of cars that theyâve seen so often.
A few patients shepherded by family, old people
or walking like old people, shuffle very slowly away
under the monumental sky. An ambulance wheels in,
lights whirling and flashing. The crow flies off.
Youâve got to tear up these drafts youâve copied,
which are nothing now but the sum of the errors
and approximations that youâve tried to correct,
although itâs not without pleasure that you view the design
of crossings out, arrows, circlings, additions, scrawls
of blue or red or black ink, plus some underlinings
you donât remember making. For what purpose
do you study your mindâs mess here, the random
chance that you tried to winâin vain, donât you see?
You were hoping for one true word thatâs neither here,
nor in those clean copies you slide into a folder andâ
in their placeâthe just-about of your abilities.
I have built up a monument as fragile as the grass,
as unstable as the daylight, as fleeting as the air, and
as fluid as the rain we see running in the streets.
Iâve consigned it to paper that will dry, and
which may burn, or be splotched by the damp
with a bloom of pink, or green, or grey mildew,
and give off a pungent earthy odour. Iâve worked
in the transient substance of a tongue that will
cease to be spoken, sooner or later, or be pronounced
some other way, forming other words to convey
other thoughts. Iâve pledged it to the oblivion certain
to enfold all that this day bathes in its sweetness.
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