The sky clears, and at the top of the street
I can hear the hen giving out her litany,
The stream rattling down the slope
In its tunnel of broom.
The lacemaker now
Stands at her window singing,
Her hand clutching her work, a cloudy ruffle
Wavering its fins in the watery breeze.
Her pale face like the sky
Slowly fills up with light, and spokes of light
Burst from the deep hooded clump of thunder, departing.
Reflected light lies about everywhere.
Like birds we approach, to sip and splash
At the edges of our watery nature, no more —
An ordinary festival that cannot be foreseen
Displays the original spindle
That never came loose, never turned,
But stayed until the long hours wrapped the stem,
Now dark, now bright, an overlapping of wonders
Each one confounding the last.
This afternoon salvation claims
Our whole attention, like grief,
Entirely here, on this side of the mountain
Where the single life is lived, the backbone
Upright, bracing for the next surprise.