Poetry

The trouble with you is you’re not
loving enough. A drastic
summons, a trumpet of

Poetry is not a code
to be broken
but a way of seeing
with the eyes shut,

William Blake saw an angel
sitting in a tree. Blondin crossed Niagara
on a cable. And Maria Taglioni
for a Russian highwayman
danced on a panther’s skin spread over the snow
in 1855.

The hawk sweeps down from his aerie,
dives among swallows,
turns over twice in the air,

It’s too beautiful today.
Even the ramshackle
Fine Arts Work Center is beautiful

While Miss Capp, older than the Constitution,
droned of checks and balances, I dutifully
filled my notebook (college-lined), and prayed