There in the shrine at Lourdes 
Embellished with old crutches, splints, and canes 
(Freely abandoned by the cured, 

In black and green and white one candle burns
Upon some pages, under a lute that leans
Against a wall. Outside the window pine

      Tourists would photograph
The sky’s long ribs in their eagerness 
     To snatch the whole

                                Early and late‚
                                Though turning grief
  May twist at springing love or halfpast life,

Rounding the bend again, bitten mountain,
arid orange clusters are the same.
Past the cemetery, Julia and I claw

High as hell, commingling with the devil’s
Curlicues, sopping skin, genuflecting bones.

Thank goodness for the money and machines.
Without them we are different, withal weird.

The town is a whistler
turn on a rock
The water runs a working curve

Glad we met
you
he told the guest

how ‘this age’
        will bear it