The Gift
Cardinals at the feeder.
Rain in the leaves.
From deepest darkness to
The lesser I emerged with the words
I don’t believe
Immediately in my mouth.
I didn’t speak.
*
Yellow leaves,
Red berries.
Berries
Of my childhood strung
On a slender branch.
From what immensity did they
Emerge, what context,
What scene?
I tried
To read me.
Propped myself
Against the pillow.
Moved my lips.
*
If you bring it forth,
What is within you
Will save you.
What is not within you—
*
Hair on the pillow.
Voices in the leaves.
I asked in what—
They said in you in you in you in you—
I was capable
Of speaking truth. I had
The truth but
Nothing to put it in.
Rain in the leaves.
A company
Passing invisible.
Don’t ask why.
*
For twenty years I lived in the
present.
Then, in a single night,
I became a shade.
Books, paintings
On the wall,
Words in my mouth but no
Memory, no need.
I listened
To the cardinals.
Happiness without reason.
Yellow leaves.
-James Longenbach
About the Author
James Longenbach's new book of poems, Draft of a Letter, will be published this spring.
