This is the cooling part of the fever,
when everything: the jumping girder
of the Golden Gate's red limb, the tall
metal tree house of the Empire State,
the black rock cliff on the Sonoma Coast,
the drawer's leftover pills, the careless
cut, the careening car, the cross walk,
the stop/go, the give up, give up, done,
all of it, slows to a real nice drive by. A view
of some tree breathing and the mind's wheels
ease up on the pavement's tug. That tree,
that one willowy thing over there,
can save a life, you know? It saves
by not trying, a leaf like some note
slipped under the locked blue door
(bathtub full, despair's drunk), a small
live letter that says only, Stay.