Arthur Vogelsang
THE VEIN
later
Daylight wasn't holding on, it had no more will across the river,
fingers of light were turning over like hands into the black
shade,
but incandescents around houses and piers
popped and sighed, searing the grey flesh of the air,
and in this way in my imagination wounds
were being burnt closed.
Almost, there's silence. You swear there's a country
where all rivers cut deeper each year,
toss up dark, squirming life, and subside.
You swear it, and you almost remember it.
I have emptied my mind,
just as
you
ache to do
as houses stick up like sores or despair
in the heavy air
in this the light of day not holding on
as if you were shutting your eyes very slowly.
Someone brought back from a few minutes of death
should be here to tell me how calm and good death is.
Would he fear the extraordinarily powerful spotlight and the
woman
walking in it a hundred yards across the river?
