Coruscating ashes of the maple,
like the advent of a migraine,
the bristling light both promise
and a reformation,

take their time, as it were.
We would return to those antique
particulars, having returned
would go again.

The opaque light scours us, acid
on metal, wiped clean,
re-etched once more—
twice bitten, once shy.

The frigates shape themselves
over the fields
that offered ridge-and-furrow
to each century in fallow turn,

shadows still visible.
How should we look,
when looking is suspect?
The eyes have been blind, blinded.

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This article originally appeared in The New Criterion, Volume 37 Number 5, on page 32
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