2

   
 
                  The silver of the Bay reflects the sky.
  As in a Fibonacci microcosm,
  Orpheus reflects the scene (home,
  she's not at home).  One almond eye

   
                  is all of Shakespeare's Globe – quintessence
  in the garden, behind Shakespeare's Head.
  Garden or marsh, Itasca or Shadda (wed
  wetlands and low clouds with innocence) –

   
                  birchbark or balam, long canoe or tarada,
  Mississippi or Euphrates, Hiawatha,
  Haji Hamaid – waters will reflect your
  silvery Dragon's Head, your starry

   
                  mornings.  Rippling conjunction,
  hovering shadow – cradle for the sun.

      
                                 *

   
                  Out of the manger-matrix comes the star
  reflected in the paysans, where you are.

   
                  Reflected in the water by the shore,
  reflected in a waiting shepherd's eye,
  reflected in the sand dunes too, nearby.
  The light was early – never seen before.

   
                  And natural law (in curvature of glass
  slanted to a singer's thirsty throat)
  found balance at the point of rest
  between power and peace – a

   
                  general outline of the lacrimae
  between brute force of interest
  and salty conscience of the just
  (black iris, fiery aureole its eye).

        12.10.02

[Reminder: Shakespeare's Head is a building in Providence. The name referred to a sort of tavern sign which used to hang outside (portrait of the Bard). Was a gathering-place for journalists, literary types, revolutionaries around 1776.]


What does this poetry mean, though, to the literati? I'm outside the committee paradigms and the bingo lingo. Toodles, chums!