“What you have to do as a writer is
. . . write day in and day out no matter what happens.”

We grappled that bird quiet between us
carefully holding its wings folded
and by whispers trying to calm the wild

My mother, who opened my eyes, who 
brought me into the terrible world, 
was guilty. Her look apologized: 

You would think while the hours helped,
if the wind was right, then follow
a current along shore till a beach

In a world where no one knows for sure
I roll my blanket for the snow to find:
come winter, then the blizzard, then demand—

At night sometimes the big fog roams in tall
from the coast and away tall on the mountain road
it stands without moving while cars wander along

A gather of apricots fruit pickers left
gleam like reasons for light going higher, higher;
I look half as hard as I can to tease

The bow bent remembers home long,
the years of its tree, the whine
of wind all night conditioning

Mother is gone. Bird songs wouldn’t let her breathe.
The skating bug broke through the eternal veil.
A tree in the forest fell; the air remembered.