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Philip Pardi: Boy In Cedar, Robin In Grass

May 16, 2011 by PBQ

Each one studies
a fabric unseen

from up close:
weaving of limbs

and what green
and such sky

and voices lulled
low. Each one

notes the other
along song-shaped

lines, discovers
sight-reading

is the closest we get
to love

if by love we mean
knowing when

to close our eyes.
Somewhere

nearby
my son

is pointing
at the moon

saying
ball, ball, ball

until eyes
close and

and
and I look:

The boy in the cedar tree sees the pattern left on the lawn by mowing, sees, for the first time, how narrow is the stretch of life between house and sidewalk, sees the robin looking up, as he himself looks up each day to gauge weather or wind, as we now look at them, boy above, bird below, and above them both, I’ll put it there now, a ball.

We incline from line
to line, from room

to room
but in truth there is

no word.
Each move, an offering

of might
against might, but

what with robin
boy and toddler

this I
is outnumbered.

The street
blurs to life,

a passing car,
robin hops

to garden wall.
It’s all I can do

to keep boy
from falling

ball from rolling
into a ditch.

And then – see
how the sounds

insert themselves
even on days

when it isn’t
about them – it becomes

clear it all
must end

in a kind
of wordlessness.

To close
your eyes

at the wrong time
can be murder,

but at the right
time, ah…

Filed Under: Contributors 70, Issue 70, Poetry, Poetry 70 Tagged With: Contributors 70, Philip Pardi, Poetry, Poetry 70

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