I want to end with four more poems.
I want to read them in pairs.
First there are two quite short ones, and then all of these
are quite recent from this year.
I think that fairly simple in that way.
And these next two and their connection
with the ones I've been reading I think explains itself.
The second one is far more discursive than the first which
is a creation myth, a tiny one, it's called "Beginning."
Long before spring, king of the black cranes
rises one day from the black needle's eye
on the white plain under the white sky.
The crown turns and the eye drilled clear through his head
turns.
It is north everywhere.
Come out, he says.
Come out then, the light is not yet divided.
It is a long way to the first anything.
Come even so, we will start.
Bring your nights with you.