Tonight I hear machines at their dark work in the dark, I understand 
the sound they make among the gaps between the trees 

Everything is fine—
the first bits of sun are on
the yellow flowers behind the low wall,

Such jazzy arrhythmia, the white storks’
Plosive and gorgeous leave-takings suggest
Oracular utterance where the blurred

Moving away from rattled towns,
gaining, as a bird in a dishwasher,
an altered view, the owlish lakefronts

Any tree would seem to grieve,
what with the hawk lonelinessing
on her desiccated perch.

Aurelian,
        who studies the emergence of butterflies 
from chrysalides,

Sparrow who drags a footlong crust of bread behind him
Sparrow whose head is pecked bald from so many quarrels

So we’ll go no more a-teething.
For now. When the urge
to perambulation strikes, feeling

Here in the open, love lies apart,
singing to its beads. How reflective is that?
Don’t be such a goose, love said.

isn’t really a tower. It’s a square
building with towers at each
of the four corners. In the thirties