The Foothills
From the confluence of rivers
the river turns flowing with the wheat
into the sun’s regions, pale,
but alive with a tuning of forked tongues;
there the young grasshoppers ascend
into clouds and the deer
just stand with the water’s
sound in their eyes;
and there the distant mountains move
away into the haze,
until, huge and tragic, they confer
with the sun’s streaming edge.
To the north, the geese, singing in the
uttermost winds,
disturb the passing moon, mistral and pale
and giant with dreams.