The feminine form
in the curved hips of the blue hills.
In the autumn tree stepping out of its dress.
Call the day quiet. Ordinary.
The motor conks where the domicile
sort of whirrs into place.
Spare wind part list and lazy chime.
The raspy energy of the mechanical thistle.
Tight old anger of the deadbolt

nearly bending the brass key.
Call the day ordinary. Bright as marble.
Unshadowing to a kind of soft line.
Not a single thing out of sorts
but the window. In it
a contrail burns toward
the bright bang of the sun.
Beside the sweep of the round clock
or the round clock beside the bedroom door.
Curved hips of the feminine form

stirring beneath blue covers.
The bright echo
she cannot catch with her hands.
A rag doll dance partner
she marches around the floor.
Not so much translation but to and fro.
In the lean. In the lean of her spine.
Not a single thing out of sorts
but the window. The clear view.

____

Recommended reading: Tug, a book of poems by Florida death row inmate, Stephen Todd Booker. Too, The Singing Creek Where the Willows Grow: The Mystical Nature Diary of Opal Whiteley. Too, the collected stories of Isaac Babel. Finally, the plays of Lanford Wilson: the Hot l Baltimore or Talley's Folly or Burn This.