breaking from cover, or the mime dance of arms cut loose

from the body;

one wakes bathed in scented oil to see a sparrow part the waters, or

move a mountain, or open a gate, yes, open twin gates, narrow

walls of stone that lead into this city or that, gates called Eyes of

the World, or Blood Fully Borne, or Morning Waking Unto Morning,

or Garden of Unearthly Delights,

and the mind clears—mayflies, the last fruits of the season,

trembling in the air above, like the air itself made visible—

and something comes through the gates....what?....what is it?....Oh,

yes, it is a woman,

no, it is two women,

and they are laughing and laughing, and carrying on.

Acknowledgments

Grateful acknowledgment is made to the editors of the following journals and anthologies, in which these poems appeared:

Another Chicago Magazine: “Lion”;

The Antioch Review: “The Dance”;

The Carolina Quarterly: “Black Swan”;

Journal of New Jersey Poets: “Blessed Is the Field”;

The Kenyon Review: “Rose of Sharon,” “The Satyr’s Heart,” “Two Boys,”

“Windfall”;

The Massachusetts Review: “Brightness from the North”;

Michigan Quarterly Review: “The Garden of the Trumpet Tree”;

New England Review: “The Dragon,” “The Foreskin,” “The Orchard,”

“The Sparrow’s Gate”;

The Recorder: The Journal of the American Irish Historical Society:

“Masque,” “Midwinter,” “Pale Rider,” “Plants Fed On by Fawns,”

“The Rain’s Consort,” “The South Gate”;

Salt Hill: “Sheet Music”;

Tamaqua: “Blacklegs”;

Third Coast: “Sheep Child”;

32 Poems: “The Wolf”;

TriQuarterly: “Elegy.”

“The Orchard” appeared in The Best American Poetry 1997, edited by David Lehman and John Hollander. “The Dragon” appeared in The Best American Poetry 2003, edited by David Lehman and Yusef Komunyakaa. “Blacklegs,” “Elegy,” The Satyr’s Heart,” “Sheet Music,” and “The South Gate,” appeared in Hammer and Blaze, edited by Ellen Bryant Voigt and Heather McHugh. “Elegy” received a Literary Award from the Illinois Arts Council. “The Orchard” and “Black Swan” appeared in The New Bread Loaf Anthology of Contemporary Poetry, edited by Stanley Plumly and Michael Collier. “Black Swan,” “Elegy,” and “Two Boys” appeared in Poets of the New Century, edited by Rick Higgerson and Roger Weingarten. “Blacklegs” appeared in The Pushcart Prize XXII: Best of the Small Presses. “The Dragon” appeared in The Pushcart Prize XXVIII: Best of the Small Presses.