Hard to tell
what looks like the stillness
of a bird from the outline of a leaf
among the scatter of what’s left
on the sycamore bearing down
on the window, here, on the page,
there, just outside, though I know
what I see as I know the air in the room
is a wall and beyond the wall
the far dark is an abstraction,
like a tree at night,
rain in a rill inside the branching,
the wind sometimes lost in the sorrow spaces—
and right now it could be dawn, cold dawn,
or the end of the day,
first light or last light holding on,
shining in a something-year-old tree,
where a bird, at the bird-height of trees,
could be a dry leaf curled,
the sun having started
or run through its spectrum,
depending on the colors, added or subtracted,
a healing, a wounding, morning or evening,
though you know, without saying, which one.
from Poetry Northwest 07.2 Fall & Winter 2012-2013More by Stanley Plumly from the library
Copyright © Stanley Plumly
Used with the permission of the author
on behalf of Poetry Northwest.