Early such darkness, these oncoming nights& sure, I’m dull & even slow to concedehow mornings make equal, swerving measuresthere between those foremost shadowsalong the fence, amid the chickens & nerve,sheep & their indifference to any pair of foolshelpless in love, who visit through the cold,shortened, everyday hours like you & meuntil, oh yes, we take the prairie like pioneers,plumb the woods with a memory of wildflowers& the skinny, skinny leaves released as purelyas the dead houses that will, come spring,vanish in fits of a blossomed green & the singularawakening in which we kiss, merely a blinklike the hurried bird across the canvas of light& afterwards, in that heave, our mothersswell, our own fathers relish again in the flesh& without, I’m told, any timeline for griefor retrieving their clothes among the fallen treeswhere we sit together, feed the river like so,dare to welcome the center of this bare,wild kingdom, the brisk & wondrous possibilitywhen we lean into the sun, close our eyes& describe for each other what colors appear.