Sweetness Is A Wind
by Barbara Jordan –
The sky’s moods engrave the lake,
shift softly its mind:
first, remember nothing, then simply, cerulean. Then —
a flock of crows
starts out over the shallows, agitates back;
and in that distraction, the right question
almost rises to matter, but drifts
before you know it.
Sometimes it isn’t anyone’s fault,
a light just leaves your heart.
And so you wait, and keep vigil for yourself
where the hills climb above Honeoye Lake,
through sycamores tipped like spent candelabra,
and through green, sweet-smelling hallways
of pine,
and finally fields of bushes and bracken,
the old kickstands of summer.
Up there, briefly, you can learn from a hawk
to feel joy — a soaring
into that blue articulate height
that doesn’t presuppose a landing place —
where sweetness is a wind
until it plummets,
drawn down by some small, too-mortal
restlessness.