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A July night full of fireflies a field of stars above a backcountry Missouri road my night soul comes out bright and dark after a daydown of chalk pastels and winter whites. I stop and stand astonished, asombro, stilled head tilted back, ears cocked, eyes of awe clairvoyant, full of sentience. My reflection lost in the radiant tangled maze of angel eyes. Do I hear a mandrake cry? Am I deranged, exiled, meandering? Such a plain passions has routed me from ordinary living I blink and pull my head out of the stars and look around, just a backcountry road —the summer stars are spirit traps— I will walk again into such a rapacious glance and pray the trap is sprung.

July, quiet as ants in the sugar. A black-haired girl will arrange

Finger-rivulets trickle from my hand & disappear w/ the velvet light Here spring's first decanting ripens into a richer liquid. The grass whispers to itself, grows. Quick, in the ink fireworks splash, women combing out their glittering hair & the sky rushes up the down steps.

I remember a performance of Antigone in which she threw herself on the floor of the universe and picked up a piece of dust. Is that the particle? It startled me. Was it Scripted? Directed? Driven? I am a girl, Antigone. I have a sister. We love each other terribly. I am a woman of property. The milk of the footlights. The folds of the curtain. I remember a performance of Antigone. She stooped. There was a wild particle. It was glorified by my distance. I heard the hooves of the dust. The ticking of the script calibrating oblivion. I saw the particle hanging and Antigone needed something to do with her hands and she did it.

After many sleight-of-hand days the sun squares itself on the white walls. Tart is what my tongue says against the slice I lay across it. Sweet say my molars. This apple grown from graft. Open the myth starred in every core – shiny useless things.

Out of the sheath dress gently hopping, sparrow in the lot below in the great complacency of summer pressing down, waves of it what can the plants do but endure this closeness the trees, their varieties, and ivy, nameless shrubs and hedges, no one speaks their names only flowers get that nod and certain grasses so that when a day of cooler breath in July airs out the neighborhood you feel for a moment the rustling in lindens, oaks, sycamores as they sense what’s been withheld for months, that’s when the mature ones rustle it off, slip almost sexily out of that dress, unbearable to feel such potential against one’s skin

I slip into the July arms of Long Lake, my chin pressed to the red vinyl pillow,

The weather has beaten us Down again; we are only animal, insect. Moths cling to the screens outside Like tiny flags pinned to a land map. Our survival's not fit for what we have In mind of giving up our shoes, solemn Talks. There must be more, more than these Empty waterjug clouds leading us Toward thirst. Today will be Like any other tomorrow. Perhaps this is just An annunciation in wandering: the feel Of miles of a beach under our feet. Those fevered Waves at a distance are overwhelmed By their own history. No one Will walk on this water.

In July the bright ones come from the ground. Stars on rented stalks cover strings of silver strewn by elven-folk who live for but a day.

All day from the grove a chorus of cicadas. In the distance, a thunderstorm flashes

Where one finishes, the other begins. On top, a band of blue; underneath, a band of green and gold, green and deep rose.

Summer has arrived, the year begins to decline.

Dreams are severed fruit Auburn pears have fallen in the field Parsley falls on the plane Sometimes the leghorn appears to have six toes I crack an egg and the moon comes out

My thoughts are crabbed and sallow, My tears like vinegar, Or the bitter blinking yellow Of an acetic star.

My summer body remembers the muscles of fish. It's tallied by whistles. It Isn't sorry. I fold it like a flag. I bring it up like a child. My knees are moons. The tide is coming. My eyelids are dams I open only for the water- god I want to believe in, the unnameable pulse of all things, the one beating in the engine of my soul circulating stardust. I turn the key in my breath and when it clicks, the world enters me. I devour summer down to the rind like an expert animal, like I've done this for every season, like my body has always been ready.

summer creeps up the front steps and while I could never be perfectly made I feel my body drift through the house like a bride and for more than necessary I am faultless and beloved

Years later, back on the island in absolute light, I am trying to remember what it was like. There was seeing, then passion, and then ravishment. After that the punishment. It is important to me that the world has not changed. This morning the women across the road came out and pulled up an armload of onions and went away. The mountain of the gods is far from town. The sea changes its color according to the hour, becoming palest just before dark.