1
the shaped infinity
to hammer home
help, and the wild geese
heading south
and every way and
which, confuse
the fall of light
the fatal peen
how, and the commonest
crow or sparrow
speak the pale
or sensing moon
2
accelerate, the swan
sing, or eloquent as
antelope, the crisp
rejoinder of the duck’s
quack to the deer’s
leap, and, even then
even, a static dream
twitter and acquit
the kill, wait, for
and the nasty snow
fall, fall and for
tonight, only, dream
This poem “Driving, Accidental, West” originally appeared in The Art of Autobiography. Spec. issue of Canadian Literature 90 (Autumn 1981): 24.
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