II: Love After the Anschluss

He wanted her and yes
she wanted him.
The summer light that flowed
across the rim of conifers
had melted them from sleep
and so with stale breath
and warm bodies they made love.

Haraka Haraka Haina Baraka
Hurry Hurry Brings No Blessing

Forgetting jobs and corporations
is a kind of cottage industry here
in Ontario
and it makes good sex.

After sex, too much began to fill
her heart for her to lie beside him still.
She stood and dressed and walked
along the stones and through the pines
down to the lake. The sun had
passed the crest of hills, and the
morning like her
was calm and quite awake.

Rowing she could feel
the water push,
her muscle pull.
Fluid water
liquid air
and rhythmic motion
everywhere
became a will.

She stopped to watch the newness of the day
sitting in the bottom of the boat
feeling the water sway.
The lake long dead from its acid bath
was clear (as clear and simple
as she wished her mind could be)
yet still responsive to the wind.
Here she could see

clear from shore to shore
from sky to floor
as though the limitless world
were merely a bubble for her soul.
And there below was that ebb,
that odd afterfeeling of having
taken her husband in.
Slowly she let herself unravel.
Ideas should be like this, she
thought, and hearts--loose,
persistent, wet, and clean.
Things and people matter
only when they travel.
Only when they unravel
do words and images mean.