THREE BY SIMON PERCHIK


An empty pail, a shovel
--with dabbler's tools the kid
rebuilds the world --by instinct 

kneels the way every wave grinds out
still more salt --simple gadgets
sweetening the sea for some great drought

covered with darkness and falling
--another hole begins to stir, the dead
so close to the rim --they hear him dig

just enough for leverage, hiding
a few fingertips, sand and all
so he can't be seen reaching out

as if the crater had suddenly filled
with marrow, was singing
outloud: a single trumpet note

everywhere invisible, spinning the center
and his dry, windless arm
covering my shoulder, Come! I'll show you.

 
 

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Before you even saw a lake
or a river or an ocean
or lifted half asleep
with stars washing over you

--hours old and already you hear
the nights left over from the Flood
and in the distance one wave
waiting for more darkness

as if it had a twin somewhere
--your first bath --by instinct
another minutes later, an overflowing
the way each tide
 
never forgets the other
--two baths and after those
nothing matters, though all your life
you wait for just a trace

some splash you almost believe
you heard before --just born
and the warm hands under you
reaching out from the soft waves

--before you ever saw water
you learned to cry -- a natural! bathed
and the night beginning to recede
to feel its damp sand creak

against what must have been the Ark
or the sun or your cradle breaking apart
under these stuffed animals
--a single dove clinging to the rail
and the first morning.

 

 

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Again the sky rubbing against my legs
the way a dog closes its eyes
--I wade toward a place

that has your hairline, your nose
lips the same--tonight's no different
although these stars once side by side

behind their invisible starting line
--a few already clustered in the lead
some last and between I walk

 

from Gemini to Sirius to Orion
--all 14 miles by myself
and in my hands an empty glass

 
that magnifies the sky -- I still look
for clues, for the ankles, the yes or no
as if the night has already forgotten

what is dead, what isn't, what
is hiding in the step by step
across an old footprint that might be there

might still be wandering and its bark
try once more for distance
the way a timekeeper's pistol is grasped

held up, but the stars
slip from under, drowning before my eyes
--the sun still alone, coming back
 
with yesterday, today, tomorrow
with the closed windows and the streets
left out too long.