LONG DAWN


It has come back, the air stung
with raw March short grass
and the call of light from the strand,
the lover’s hair strewing again.
It has brought its far
scent of apple blossoms and new sand,
the desert’s miles mellowed
by the beckoning swishing of palms.
But it has brought
a severe lingering too,
strung in between
the swarming windows of birds,
it has brought thoughts
in utter nakedness, one by one
spangled on the strand’s instants
with what you haven’t yet done.
A bright, long hole of dawn

and hole of the unknown in your heart.
And mothers’ loom at the water’s edge,
the silver shuttles that rise and fall
and your time running

quietly short.