for Joel Newberger

Hit the ball
back at the pitcher
it will confuse
the enemy with answers

2.
the cliffs crumble yes
but not while we’re watching
there is a number
deep in every stone

3.
so I have come to
teach you how to
dance this footless
figure round the maypole
the fleeing center
that is always right here

4.
as if there were children
in the house we never see
or a genital smell seems
left on the wind.
All bodies one body?

5.
it snowed last night
up the mountain there
over the river and
the wind wild down here
you shook a tree at me
you chilled my pillow

6.
because there is only you and me
to share one world, one verb,
no room for another, you
are the other

7.
o sea thou eldest spectacle
let me visit thee again,
teach me the truths
that vision’s for,
to anatomize the bodiless
and read the minute print
of everything that writes
by moving and everything moves

8.
hear the counsellors
rapping on the door
let them a little in
it’s cold out there
or hot dry wind so
be kind as wood
kind as water listens,
every one is a messenger

9.
and every two
a common-law marriage,
let the priest sleep
o be common be
common and be true
the government alas
is our eldest son
a greedy selfish sort
mind of his own

10.
so we drank the morning
and chewed all afternoon
visitors came bearing cakes
small ones from a city
you could taste the population
thick and dark and sweet
there is no night to such a day

11.
to know the gender of the sun
is all I meant,
reverence for Her difference
light is the mother milk
come drink with me

12.
it takes so long to be quick
let me be slow
and let you go
wandering my field
it goes as far as you
feel like walking

13.
of course I try
to be a tree
for you to dance around
and you do

14.
one waits for the day
when we eat no more beasts
and live on light alone
cloud sandwiches
drizzle for dessert

15.
but so long to wait
and even now
breakfast snarling at the gate

16.
so magic is the answer
go on and on and on
the conversation drivels on
and yet you rise
wise from it and carry
wisdom into silence
to let it sing

17.
how little it takes
to make
and so we do

18.
happy May Day
to the fence and the forest
the wool and the marigold
so many challenges churches
circuses scars
so many stars
the dance is us
I say
so go and play.

1 May 2021