Excerpt from The Descent

THE MOUNTAIN
Three men gather. To honor another who has died,
To set a stone in his favorite meadow.
They walk into mountains until coming to a field
Where one man decides to sit awhile. Two men
Continue up the watershed, speaking
Of women and hay and how it has been too long
Since the rains, even the elk have come down.
When they get to the next clearing, the second man
Climbs into a tree and falls asleep. He is tired
And does not want to be with the other.
Into the cold evening the third man rises, and the owl waits
Until she can no longer. He holds his hands
Over a fire he has built in the treeless North.
He is thinking of the descent, all of it.


HOLY

At the cross of the cross
Is the part that holds. Two roads
Meet; after that is the work of continuing

On. Beyond intersection
Lies departure, which is then to see
What goes on without you, what

Does not go wrong. One tree reconciles
Against another; arm over arm,
A man across a woman in a contract

Of the one thing they know
They do well, which is the beginning
Of how one will soon leave

The other. They cannot turn back
For what they have made in the air
Already discloses agreement, and

Is where many have stopped to rest.


BIRTHDAY

The tree becomes a sign I pass
Of how it has gone on; branches that hold
Up the first stars like waiting candles

Against the coming night. I have learned
To live with less and less
While the child in the backseat sleeps

Believing she is already home.
Out of her hand falls one shoe,
Her mouth is stained with whatever kind
Of paradise she has wished for,

And something in my mind
Darts across the road, a small animal
Moving perfectly between tires
As I look back to see nothing changed.

Copyright 2004 by Sophie Cabot Black. All rights reserved.