A Season at Bishopsgate, 1815
(Mary standing on a boulder;
a small sealed box between her feet)
One brief and tranquil summer
I was led to pardon the timing of Fate
as shade went away from the shadow
bringing the hot spotted rooms of Bishopsgate
where the white beams of each ceiling smiled;
from this height dusk plummets & ignites
as distance narrows quickly to a lone house
taken without hesitancy to remain Scandal’s family.
I forget…
as shade went away from the shadow?
Tis it! The memory again grants my entry,
layers of daylight lower into the sun’s iris,
on the air appears my Percy’s sad cooing aziola
come to fuse a pair of opposite seasons;
my soles accept the glacier’s need to sharpen stone
much I actually feel begins in the foot,
atop this still & cracked example of Time’s skill.
I retrieve…
layers of daylight lower into the sea’s iris
Was it! We took this same hour on the water,
a quick quiet trip to find the forest in reflections,
grief had not grown to the size of the creature
in me today, our minds adrift in the love of awe;
if I were to leap the only reason could be clear
such a short fall far too fair to satisfy,
left to go on, the lost figurehead of the Don Juan.
