DAVID WELCH


                                     



AFTER RILKE

 

 

                       —a cento


1.

not from shyness     this silence of theirs
no ear but is half broken

              and nearly touchable

air without object     a gust within God     a wind
grows now too heavy for you to bear

~

all becomes arbor

                          resurrected
              into all that may be seen

and flings it     free of sorrow     heavenward

~

antenna to antenna we posit
              this sweetness     thick at first
begrudging us

              changing like cloud formations

in course of time they break
though we     like swimmers     tax ourselves
                                                                           at length



2.

you whom I loved like an unnamed flower

                          you breeze     so full of spots

who with the dead

              by one deft touch
do we know     or do we not

 

 

                                                                                                      

 

      

 

                                   

 

 


TYPO 28