Tomb Figurine
My eye was a little sun working
In reverse. Flame cast light but did not blind;
A stone threw heat it gained and glowed darking
As it cooled. I threw my sight down in lines
On lines: shadows that dropt light upward as shade
That shines. Day a syllable that dawns
On western margin noon a fiery point
Pressing a circle down in grass it cannot burn
As if a deer woke walked east into night—
Day was sleep’s shape left alone in a field.
Nothing was the sun. Hours polishing rhyme
Into a silver knob at line’s end locked
On my study’s door. No heat save breath—
The sun a distant eye working in reverse.
[first published in Pool]
