Poetry

Or else a room, and in the room five voices speaking at once and what delicious babble “sherbet” and “velvet” and “purple” and “fragrant” and “loud”—

Cuando todos los siglos vuelven,
anocheciendo, a su belleza,
sube al ambito universal
la unidad honda de la tierra.

Like two wrestlers etched
around some ancient urn,

we’d lace our hands, then wrench
each other’s wrists back

Last of the Romany race,
Haply a king and queen,
Meal it with sorry grace
On the highway border of green.

This land is heavy with sleeping generations
Of young forefathers who thrust back the hills
And cleared their pastures of blackberry blossoms, planting

Deep roll the breakers where we run
  Along the sands,
And up the blue deep rolls the sun
  From sunny lands.