Reason
Sonnets (Sequence: Light)
Find a room and light it. There is reason
For silence, the still taste of water,
The raw air of snow out of season,
And darkness? None. The eye makes matter
Mix and dissolve. White sky over rye fields,
A litter of screws, are air fixed by light
Into form. And night? Its slow, slack gaze yields
No force. (— Dreams, you mumble, seeing bright
Sails sheaved in gold, a child rapt over eels.)
So sentinels of sleep crowd our days
Interleaving intelligence in shade while
Across the dawn broad white kites laze.
But the breeze is so light that if felt, we take it
Not for a sough, but for the leaf itself.
Find a room and light it. There is reason
For silence, the still taste of water,
The raw air of snow out of season,
And darkness? None. The eye makes matter
Mix and dissolve. White sky over rye fields,
A litter of screws, are air fixed by light
Into form. And night? Its slow, slack gaze yields
No force. (— Dreams, you mumble, seeing bright
Sails sheaved in gold, a child rapt over eels.)
So sentinels of sleep crowd our days
Interleaving intelligence in shade while
Across the dawn broad white kites laze.
But the breeze is so light that if felt, we take it
Not for a sough, but for the leaf itself.