The dawn was apple-green,
The sky was green wine held up in the sun,
The moon was a golden petal between.
She opened her eyes, and green
They shone, clear like flowers undone,
For the first time, now for the first time seen.
I'm in a wild neglected niche,
Mojave joins the sublime ditch.
Out from Lake Meade where deserts burn
As heat surrounds a cooking urn.
These fiery winds may take their toll
Infernos' depths; devil's punch bowl.
Bright ochre sands like burnished chrome
Reflects the sun, earth's nascent home.
Grand Canyon's wild. So am I.
Wild donkeys thrive with coyotes nigh.
Cactus water, at least, is clean
When hunger gnaws, there's mesquite beans.
Let coyotes howl. Old owls can hoot
It had been four days of no weather
as if nature had conceded its genius to the indoors.
They'd closed down the Bureau of Sad Endings
and my wife sat on the couch and read the paper out loud.
The evening edition carried the magic death of a child
backlit by a construction site sunrise on its front page.
I kept my back to her and fingered the items on the mantle.
Souvenirs only reminded you of buying them.
* * *
The moon hung solid over the boarded-up Hobby Shop.
Bring down the moon for genteel Janet;
She's too refined for this gross planet.
She wears garments and you wear clothes,
You buy stockings, she purchases hose.
She say That is correct, and you say Yes,
And she disrobes and you undress.
Confronted by a mouse or moose,
You turn green, she turns chartroose.
Her speech is new-minted, freshly quarried;
She has a fore-head, you have a forehead.
Nor snake nor slowworm draweth nigh her;
You go to bed, she doth retire.
To Janet, births are blessed events,
I.
Where freezing wastes of dazzl'ing Snow
O'er LEMAN'S Lake rose, tow'ring;
The BARON GOLFRE'S Castle strong
Was seen, the silv'ry peaks among,
With ramparts, darkly low'ring!--
Tall Battlements of flint, uprose,
Long shadowing down the valley,
A grove of sombre Pine, antique,
Amid the white expanse would break,
In many a gloomy alley.
A strong portcullis entrance show'd,
With ivy brown hung over;
And stagnate the green moat was found,
Whene'er the Trav'ller wander'd round,
The day that I was christened-
It's a hundred years, and more!-
A hag came and listened
At the white church door,
A-hearing her that bore me
And all my kith and kin
Considerately, for me,
Renouncing sin.
While some gave me corals,
And some gave me gold,
And porringers, with morals
Agreeably scrolled,
The hag stood, buckled
In a dim gray cloak;
Stood there and chuckled,
Spat, and spoke:
"There's few enough in life'll
Be needing my help,
But I've got a trifle
In gold and grey, with fleering looks of sin,
I watch them come; by two, by three, by four,
Advancing slow, with loutings they begin
Their woven measure, widening from the door;
While music-men behind are straddling in
With flutes to brisk their feet across the floor,—
And jangled dulcimers, and fiddles thin
That taunt the twirling antic through once more.
They pause, and hushed to whispers, steal away.
With cunning glances; silent go their shoon
On creakless stairs; but far away the dogs
A mile behind is Gloucester town
Where the flishing fleets put in,
A mile ahead the land dips down
And the woods and farms begin.
Here, where the moors stretch free
In the high blue afternoon,
Are the marching sun and talking sea,
And the racing winds that wheel and flee
On the flying heels of June.
Jill-o'er-the-ground is purple blue,
Blue is the quaker-maid,
The wild geranium holds its dew
Long in the boulder's shade.
Wax-red hangs the cup
From the huckleberry boughs,
Unless you come of the gipsy stock
That steals by night and day,
Lock your heart with a double lock
And throw the key away.
Bury it under the blackest stone
Beneath your father's hearth,
And keep your eyes on your lawful own
And your feet to the proper path.
Then you can stand at your door and mock
When the gipsy vans come through...
For it isn't right that the Gorgio stock
Should live as the Romany do.
Unless you come of the gipsy blood
They intend to send a wire
To the moon;
And they'll set the Thames on fire
Very soon;
Then they learn to make silk purses
With their rigs
From the ears of LADY CIRCE'S
Piggy-wigs.
And weasels at their slumbers
They'll trepan;
To get sunbeams from cuCUMbers
They've a plan.
They've a firmly rooted notion
They can cross the Polar Ocean,
And they'll find Perpetual Motion
If they can!
These are the phenomena
That every pretty domina
Hopes that we shall see
