​The whole world is in a sandwich,
It is narrow but it is tall,
On the inside it is vast,
So that the radiant songs pall

Of the inner forest with its 
Burled trees, with its black-
Eyed bluebirds, spreading
Across mountains, on the back

Of hills. Sometimes a bear trap
Snaps, the bear roras and drops
His head. Then the lights of
Love and awe, in the copse

The psychedelic passiflora
Bunched shrubs across the dun
Trunks of dim trees, the wind
Stirs, and gilds the web spun,

And the water trickling down
The hillside soaks the crinkling
Lichen, the moss grows soft

​It is all revealed, in a sense,
Everything permissible, everything
That swings from thought to thought,
All the balls of hail that ping

And bounce upon the sidewalk,
All the freewheeling, the canvases,
All of it is free, from Houston Street
To Salsbury, the drinks that fizz,

The soul picks up its leather 
Luggage, it’s standing at the top
Of a hill with a long scarf
And no way that it can drop,

But—it still hasn’t found
A house to live in, it still
Hasn’t found a tower, it
Cannot yet cross the sill

And take the car, it still
Cannot travel thoughout
The length and breadth of the mind
And history, inside and out.

​From the top of the cosmos,
From the checkerboard where time
Goes forwards and backwards,
From the top of the paradigm,

From the granite fathers
Of the world, an inheritance
Of freedom, of service 
Of vast circumference,

Revealing the heart, the veins
And arteries, crystal lights
And cement sidewalks, that snaps
Holy photographs, bright insights,

Of every fact, of every form
Of life, of every imagery
Of time, of all the flicking
Frames of syzygy.

​If we are stunned by a conception
So large that the entire
Universe cannot fit inside, 
Let our heart not crackle with fire.

If shafts of light blur our sight,
So that the colors are stained
And dim, out-of-focus threads
Of flame hover before us, veined,

That is the start of the weaving
Of clear lights, of lines
Rich with life, strong
Boulders, rain-dropping pines.

With that, we stride with vigor, and
We find ourselves amidst green
Shadows of trees, we go up
A mountain to where a keen

Wind skirts the edge between
Being and no being, we come
To a place space ceases to matter,
The patter of numbers creates no sum,

There is delight, the world
Is Rembrandt and van Gogh,
The mansion doors swing open,
Every space is emptied of imbroglio.

The strength of our song will rise,
The dew hanging in the shrubs
Will whisper, we will hear secrets,
The formulas of heaven and cubs’

Mewls, and palisades that zigzag
On the cliffs, the river courses
And it surges, we watch it on the bridge,
It rushes with the strength of horses.

​It gets in your bones, it seems
So high-falutin’ but it gets
In your bones; it gets in your
Walk, it sets aside regrets;

It gets in your thoughts, in
The rooms and the roads, in
The crampons and belaying ropes;
In going to get aspirin;

In seeing the ground of being
The history of volcanoes in a slab
Of stone; in these all, the light
That soaks through the drab.

Otherwise, you are seized up,
The sidewalk is angled, the air
Is damp, the sky lowers,
Everything is shoddy, a porch chair,

A glass ornament, an overweight
Cat, just a street, a fence,
Orange flowers, cars sliding,
A brooding of inconsequence,

You cannot, inside yourself,
Soar, you cannot, inside
Yourself, live, you yearn
For the crash and sliding of the tide.

​If we don’t reveal—through a
Return to you not because
We are afraid, not because we
Seek applause, or follow laws;

Through a faith that meets you
In the park, that sights you
Where the traffic swells, where
In the dark smoke blights you;

In the orchard, where the showy
Apples keep their seeds concealed,
In the field, where puffballs
Free their spores; or a yield

Of golden sparks in a sifting pan;
Of ore shoots and hidden veins--
The light that hovers, not white,
But not not-white, then hurricanes

Strap the coast, drive mud upon
The trunks, drive down the hawks,
Strip the maples and hollyhocks,
Batter and flatten the wheat stalks,

The osprey staggers, its wing dragging,
The sky, its natural home, is gray,
Is shattering with pellets of rain,
Till at night it sees the Milky Way.

​The first thought requires
No adjustment—the thought of how
The cosmos ought to be--
The spin ice and the Holstein cow,

Because, you understand,
If you do something right,
You don’t have to change
Your mind. That isn’t so bright

To create a house and then seek
Variances. But once the house
Was built and the children 
Playing, laundry drying, one spouse

Saying, “Dear, I think we need
To talk,” the power of their life
Stretches, pulses, causes 
Re-evaluations, the knife

On the mantel could hurt someone,
The cat seeks a chaise longue
To trim its nails, the dripping
Trail of a soapy sponge,

Then you cry, Oh Architect!
I know I don’t deserve it,
But please come back, adjust
This home, somehow I don’t fit.

To exist, to fit right there,
Right there in the plans,
Is sweet, is approved,
Attested to by artisans,

Fitting into the deep structure,
The force of tau or quark or color,
That justifies its nature
A sweet, tornadoing cruller.

​If you are weak and tired,
You open the door to every wrong
Measure. Depression creeps in,
And it rolls headlong

To anger and to pride,
To jealousy and hate.
The dirty water slops 
In the hold and soaks the freight.

Therefore, when your muscles
Bulge, when your core is strong,
The entire forest sings, one
Lapsang leaf bush yields souchong.

When you are weak, you draw
Into your flesh the power
Of your soul, the streams
Descend into a dour

Depth. Rustling down the cliff
They were thankful and clear.
But when the earth provides
Its own strength, the dear

Lights fling up, the storks
Circling, and letters are stitched
In space and flight, each
Man on every path is enriched.

He lifts up the package from
The depths of a stalactite 
Cave, the small white birds
That will return to daylight,

And expeditions head north
To the aurora borealis.
And the maids wipe the sparkling
Windows of every palace.

The small asters line the walk.
The hyrax and the hare,
The chipmunk and the beaver,
Complement the black bear.

Imagine a herd of elk
Pretending to be wolverines,
Loping about the woods,
Crouching mad-eyed in the ravines.

But we in our camp we still know
That we are human beings, we
Are not berserkers, although
We still must undo our anomie,

Although we still must awake
In the moonlight, we must
Scour our entire camp, 
Reinforce, scrape the rust,

Oil the pans, scuff shoes,
Until the wheat bursts its husk,
Mandrakes blossom violet petals,
The fires glimmer at dusk.

​Bees are buzzing around my head
Some of the flowers are yellow, some
Are cobalt blue, the tree trunks
Are trying to stand up straight—umm,

That’ll do. Someone’s singing--
So it goes—someone’s delivering
A lecture—at five in the morning,
Everything’s soaked with dew, I’m shivering,

There’s a path through the grass,
It says “Walk,” I walk, then
“Live,” I live, the broad leaves
Of the fern puff out their oxygen,

And everything you say is green
The bird songs chink the air,
And maple trees are dropping seeds
And daws dart everywhere.

​So the trees lack the energy to grow.
The chlorophyll is sluggish. Then
The rats multiply, they swarm
Across the forest floor, gen-

Erations after generations, and
They breed disease, the sleeping
Illness, the will to death, 
And that transmutes, creeping

Across the forest floor, infecting
The air and songbirds with anger
And with pride, envy, hate,
And more, all draped in languor.

The river gives its might
To the aquifer, and the river
Banks are steep, brown and slick.
When the aquifer doesn’t shiver

In its thirsty black corridors
But flows robust, the river
Races, tumbles, flows elegantly,
The sunbeams on its ripples quiver,

The trout hurl their slim, muscled
Bodies, straining upstream,
The dragonfly dart, a tributary
Floats the eggs of the bream.

Everything is clear, nothing
Is weighted down, no leaf,
No stamen cries for attention,
No fallen, sealed pine cone is chief

Among the others. Sap
Crystallizes crazy white,
In the afternoon everything
After the rain. The flight

Of the damselflies, the wren
Chirping, the screech
Of the crow, a gust releases
A shower from the leaves of the beech,

It inspires the hammering of a red-headed
Woodpecker. When the flesh is weak,
A person drags artificial colors,
Drenched photos, each a freak, 

His spirit swells, his pores black,
His forehead wrinkled and puffed,
His eyes are blank of any memory
Of sunshine, he has sloughed

Away bright colors, songbirds
And wildcats roaming the north
Woods, the subtle and tender
Grasses, pale lichen, forgotten. Henceforth,

The plague spreads from a tree
To a forest. Poor, dejected
Hills, stuffing themselves 
Because they feel so disrespected,

Flinging up false trees, false
Bugs and birds, protrusions
Granite streaked green and rust.
Thank goodness, beside these bleak delusions

The sap still slowly seeps in
The maple tree. Still, the sad
Sigh of the first rough winds, 
A wind that blew from Bagdad,

That wound its way from the Pleiades,
Requires a wind that will blow
Through the cirrus clouds, that 
Will make the star fields glow,

That will ruffle the tail of the crow,
That will stagger the light till
The field and the river yield
Their fruit and the grain flows from the mill.