(for Daniel Bidwell)
Earthly paradise
and these words,
fare of broken reigns.
Miglior fabbro
your poems are peopled with ghosts,
hiking uphill in springtime.
I worship this obscurity,
your lens too powerful
to touch.
Or do those gentle ghosts
resort to
psychology?
Banishing love to the attic
where the sun floods
through the shattered roof.
Commended,
I return
the gift.
Not with Rabelais or Joyce
your cups, but doe-eyed Basho
and the girls lovely.