Wendell Berry, "The Thief"

[ladymac.livejournal.com]

I think of us lying asleep,
eyes and hands filled with the dark,
when the arm of the night
entered, reaching into the pockets
of our empty clothes. We slept
in the element of that power,
innocent of it, preserved from it
not even by our wish.
As though not born, we were carried
beyond an imminence we did not
waken to, as passively as stars
are carried eyond their spent
shining--our eyes granted to the light
again, by what chance or price
we do not even know.

Robert Wrigley

[ian-gazarek.livejournal.com]

"Clemency"

Over the trough, the long face of the horse,
and croaking dead center in a hoof print,
a toad—all the while the redwing blackbirds
drilling their whistly bells. February,
and a sudden, unearthly spring. God above me,
I am halfway through this field, a feeding,
the season, my life. If it pleases you, then hear me:
what I would ask is ten thousand more afternoons
like this, though doubtless the unkilled fleas, scintillant
and fat, will bedevil the dogs and cats,
and a few, skin-weary, will fall among
the rumpled bedclothes to catch us there,
my lover and me, and marry us done.
But please, just let this long light be garlanded by birds
and the garrulous, sloe-eyed toad.
Let the mare scratch her ear all down the length of me.
Let her breathe where the lick of memory wants.