Espaliered tree of my quieting ovaries,
arched in their lightless cloister,
& his milky seed's circuitous passage there:

O, bodily mysteries, remind my Love
how love is impossible
unless we know it to be so—the way,

walking up the mountain, he feasts,
first, on the pond, hushed in its berceuse
spin of mist, then, farther up,

on the grove of unburdened trees
in their stand of gold.
How to hold it all at once,

except by passion's climb,
its rising tides & breathless,
hawk's-eye view? Believe the fallen leaf

from one world floats there,
in another, tawny star on the black water,
the soul's cradle,

even when he must pause
to rest his racing heart,
& cannot see it?