O Lovely One, when to the ravished sight
Thou wilt unveil that radiant face of thine,
Each atom of the worlds, catching thy light,
Reflecting thee, bright as a sun shall shine.

Walk not, my flower, within the garden close,
Lest thou should give the the bulbul new distress;
For at thy glance each blossom turns a rose
To lure him with her cruel loveliness.

Victorious One, thou hast unsheathed thy sword,
The scimitar of thy beauty gleams again,
So over all thy lovers thou art Lord,
Holding dominion in the hearts of men.

Yon friend, by whom our dwelling A fay's abiding-place was,
In whom, like Peris, nothing, From head to foot, of base was;

That sage of me belovéd, That moon in whom united
Good breeding, ay, and insight With every lovesome grace was;

The baleful planets tore her From me: how could I hinder?
The author of the evil The moon's revolving race was.

“Here,” quoth my heart, “I'll sojourn, In hope of her.” Poor dullard!
It knew not that its Loved One Departing hence apace was.

The veil from my heart's secret Not only hath been rended:

A little valley round me lies
Circled about by silent hills;
Above it sweep the endless skies—
In Spring, it is all daffodils;
In Summer, the sweetbrier grows
For those who seek; then, wistful days
Soften through Autumn, till the snows
Lie white on all the quiet ways.

The many, many ways that wend
Their many paths the valley through!
I cannot trace them to the end—
They stretch a little space in view
And then (ah, some are rough to tread!
But some all gently travel on
With sunlight shining overhead)

Awake, our souls! away, our fears!
Let every trembling thought be gone;
Awake, and run the heavenly race,
And put a cheerful courage on!

True, 'tis a strait and thorny road,
And mortal spirits tire and faint;
But they forget the mighty God,
That feeds the strength of every saint,—

The mighty God, whose matchless power
Is ever new and ever young,
And firm endures, while endless years
Their everlasting circles run.

Sunk in the cushion of a high arm-chair,
A volume resting where his knees are crost,
With one hand slowly fumbling through his hair,
There sits the boy in magic pages lost.

At times he lifts a grave, though youthful face,
Revealing depths of eyes of liquid brown;
He seems a traveler from some far-off place
Who flees us as his flitting glance turns down.

O, dreamy boy, with fair May-morning brow,
What realms of wonders lure your restless feet?
In what far kingdom are you treading now?
What distant ocean bears your wandering fleet?

Post malè civili servatum more pudorem,
Legitimosque dies et tempora lapsa loquendi
Sera quidem penito sed prompta è pectoris antro
Gratia Regalem gestit pensare favorem.
Mirum equidem infami quisquam sua labra reatu
Damnet, et æterno traducat crimme nomen
Heu nimis ingrati. Decimum jam Phœbus ab undis
Advexit temone diem, totiesque sub undas
Demersit roseo flexos temone jugaleis,
Ex quo voce tua Rex augustissime Regum
Copia facta mihi primum calcare cubile,
Obtutus captare sacros, bibere aure loquelas,

Dear Ma and Pa
What shall I say
Well how's it going then
I'm not so bad myself
With love your loving son
Can't just put that
Shirley I'm writing to the folks
Dear Ma and Pa
How are you then these days
I'm just about OK
Send money or failing that
Send food or failing that
Send love
With love your loving son
Shit no I can't put that
They wouldn't understand
Shirley it's time for the results
Shirley is doing fine
Who's she they'll say
Remember Shirley
That blonde last year
Shit of course they won't

Are they sleepwalkers?
Look at them all
Silhouetted there
In a long line
Grandfather father son grandson
Each with his arms stretched out in front
Trudging along
One behind the other
In single file
To the cliff edge.

Look at your lineage.
Your father pushing your grandfather
Over the cliff edge
And you pushing your father
Over the cliff edge
And the long line
Still plodding on
Each man's hands in his father's back
And look, that's you
Up there now
At the front of the queue.

Starlit cliffs & then, all sudden,
when echo wanes &
crevice depopulates surface reason,
I go into the house of thick
green calling, overfed by oracle
crest and tendentious disclaimer.

Bridges freeze but remain passable
even in fog. The road goes nowhere











Used by permission of the author.

On Christmas Day, Kathleen and I
propel a raft with plastic spoons
through the hissing fur of surf,
stirring as we go
an Alka-Seltzer sun.

We pass Bolinas-Stinson School,
the fire house, and Smiley's dive;
extinguished geodesic domes
along the mesa road
where Cream Saroyan lives.

With a telescope, my sister spies
the erstwhile chemist of Argonne
who left his post to polish glass.
As penance, he engraves
a glyph of hydrogen

on the blank face of every cliff
from Monterey to Inverness.