“Anyone who writes is a seeker. You look at a blank page and you’re seeking. That role is assigned to us and never removed.”

 I had left my passport at an inn we stayed at for a night or so whose name I couldn’t remember. This is how it began. The next hotel would not receive me. A beautiful hotel, in an orange grove, with a view of the sea.

Today the sun was shining
so my neighbor washed her nightdresses in the river—
she comes home with everything folded in a basket,

They told her she came out of a hole in her mother
but really it’s impossible to believe
something so delicate could come out of something

Spring comes quickly: overnight
the plum tree blossoms,
the warm air fills with birdcalls.

My mother made figs in wine—
poached with cloves, sometimes a few peppercorns.
Black figs, from our tree.

A cool wind blows on summer evenings, stirring the wheat.
The wheat bends, the leaves of the peach trees
rustle in the night ahead.