Too much rain

loosens trees.

In the hills giant oaks

fall upon their knees.

You can touch parts

you have no right to—

places only birds

should fly to.

ANGLES OF SUN

Only some

angles of sun

can grow corn,

which must be

drawn up by heat.

Where it is

barely warm

no one even

wants to eat

that kind of

light-fattened kernel

packed tight

like feed-lot beef cattle.

When obliquely lit

people think sweet,

they delight

in the tentative,

the partial, the

dish of berries

whose purple

varies.

BAD DAY

Not every day

is a good day

for the elfin tailor.

Some days

the stolen cloth

reveals what it

was made for:

a handsome weskit

or the jerkin

of an elfin sailor.

Other days

the tailor

sees a jacket

in his mind

and sets about

to find the fabric.

But some days

neither the idea

nor the material

presents itself;

and these are

the hard days

for the tailor elf.

AMONG ENGLISH VERBS

Among English verbs

to die is oddest in its

eagerness to be dead,

immodest in its

haste to be told—

a verb alchemical

in the head:

one speck of its gold

and a whole life’s lead.

LIME LIGHT

One can’t work

by lime light.

A bowlful

right at

one’s elbow

produces no

more than

a baleful

glow against

the kitchen table.

The fruit purveyor’s

whole unstable

pyramid

doesn’t equal

what daylight did.

WHY WE MUST STRUGGLE

If we have not struggled

as hard as we can

at our strongest

how will we sense

the shape of our losses

or know what sustains

us longest or name

what change costs us,

saying how strange

it is that one sector

of the self can step in

for another in trouble,

how loss activates

a latent double, how

we can feed

as upon nectar

upon need?

DROPS IN THE BUCKET

At first

each drop

makes its

own pock

against the tin.

In time

there is a

thin lacquer

which is

layered and

relayered

till there’s

a quantity

of water

with its

own skin

and sense

of purpose,

shocked at

each new violation

of its surface.

THE JOB

Imagine that

the job were

so delicate

that you could

seldom—almost

never—remember

it. Impossible

work, really.

Like placing

pebbles exactly

where they were

already. The

steadiness it

takes . . . and

to what end?

It’s so easy

to forget again.

CLOSELY WATCHED THINGS

A too closely watched flower

blossoms the wrong color.

Excess attention to the jonquil

turns it gentian. Flowers

need it tranquil to get

their hues right. Some

only open at midnight.

DUTCH

Much of life

is Dutch

one-digit

operations

in which

legions of

big robust

people crouch

behind

badly cracked

dike systems

attached

by the thumbs

their wide

balloon-pantsed rumps

up-ended to the

northern sun

while, back

in town, little

black-suspendered

tulip magnates

stride around.

CRASH

Slip is one

law of crash

among dozens.

There is also

shift—

moving a

granite lozenge