I could not reach it even in dreams.

But one morning at the summer’s end

I remember it again, as though its being

lifts into mind in undeniable flood,

and I carry my boat down through the fog,

over the rocks, and set out.

I go easy and silent, and the warblers

appear among the leaves of the willows,

their flight like gold thread

quick in the live tapestry of the leaves.

And I go on until I see, crouched

on a dead branch sticking out of the water,

a heron – so still that I believe

he is a bit of drift hung dead above the water.

And then I see the articulation of feather

and living eye, a brilliance I receive

beyond my power to make, as he

receives in his great patience

the river’s providence. And then I see

that I am seen. Still as I keep,

I might be a tree for all the fear he shows.

Suddenly I know I have passed across

to a shore where I do not live.

THE COUNTRY OF MARRIAGE

The Old Elm Tree by the River

Shrugging in the flight of its leaves,

it is dying. Death is slowly

standing up in its trunk and branches

like a camouflaged hunter. In the night

I am wakened by one of its branches

crashing down, heavy as a wall, and then

lie sleepless, the world changed.

That is a life I know the country by.

Mine is a life I know the country by.

Willing to live and die, we stand here,

timely and at home, neighborly as two men.

Our place is changing in us as we stand,

and we hold up the weight that will bring us down.

In us the land enacts its history.

When we stood it was beneath us, and was

the strength by which we held to it

and stood, the daylight over it

a mighty blessing we cannot bear for long.

Kentucky River Junction

to Ken Kesey & Ken Babbs

Clumsy at first, fitting together

the years we have been apart,

and the ways.

But as the night

passed and the day came, the first

fine morning of April,

it came clear:

the world that has tried us

and showed us its joy

was our bond

when we said nothing.

And we allowed it to be

with us, the green

shining.

*

Our lives, half gone,

stay full of laughter.

Free-hearted men

have the world for words.

Though we have been

apart, we have been together.

*

Trying to sleep, I cannot

take my mind away.

The bright day

shines in my head

like a coin

on the bed of a stream.

*

You left

your welcome.

Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

Love the quick profit, the annual raise,

vacation with pay. Want more

of everything ready-made. Be afraid

to know your neighbors and to die.

And you will have a window in your head.

Not even your future will be a mystery