Ego Wearing a Bandana

I crave the thin blankets of summer sleep.

I see the stilted beauty of egrets at rest,

feel the waning song in the heart of the swordfish,

hooked and struggling without success.

Though the shadows proclaim humanity on the run,

you are steadfast like the glassy-eyed fish.

You needn’t remind me that flowers sway

in the grotto of yesterday’s expedition

because here they are now—stretching within

the impossible little cup of my mind

while claiming the joke is on me.

Flowers in a grotto? No, impossible—

unless you drink poetry for breakfast,

sipping then gulping until you explode.

I am nothing if not intransigent.

Flowers can bloom anywhere,

anywhere I say.

Poem for Grace Cavalieri

            My smile is becoming a page.

                          —Peter Gizzi

Now there is a once upon a time

too harmonious for the age:

with their marvelous sonar

the bats in the cave

detect Cavalieri’s dream

of a mouse sleeping in the pocket

of the coat on the hook

on the wall of the house

next to the hill

where wild berries abound

as an eternal temptation

to the fox and the dove

and the man wearing gloves

that fit kindly and loosely

while keeping his hands

warmer than the kitten’s belly

as it sleeps near the fire . . . .