If done steadily, and with the kind of patience that belies all fear, 
it is indeed possible to walk the plank backward from the doom 
of vanishing

After a long night swimming
In the dry dark of a book
I heard outside my window 

She asserts herself at the damnedest times—
when they’re working out at the gym, say,
or having a brandy and cigar with the boys.

The miracle began with a miracle.
I was sitting in my gold-trimmed chariot
(well, not exactly my chariot—like all

A cup before coffee, a shell
  after the scrambled egg,
I am a big nothing

This hill and the old house on it
are all we have. Two acres,
more or less—half crabby lawn,

And, after the explosion, made spheres sing,
A pure expression of pure poetry,
Like rising rain or a nation with no

Perpetual peace. Perpetual light.
From a distance it all seems graffiti.
Gold on gold. Iridescent, torqued phosphors.

Music for when the music is over
Is what a poem is. There’s no music
In a poem, just the imaginary

The barn is warm, come inside, lie down,
sleep. Here, no sheep ever fails