moving around in darkness

there is a plane of white cloth that collects light and holds it

like a sheet on the line holds the wind and sun

holds the smell of outside even after it's brought in

i love it

let's let the world speak

let's you and i not say anything

white and white, but

white by Amy Clampitt

over the great inland
riverbeds   the greater
lakebeds   a runneled
skitter   by dusk a blur

swarms   interspersing glooms
of conifers the far
side of the pass with
mazily hexagonal

lopsided falling things
or substances   or stuffs
bear paw   ear flap   rabbit
scut    the mirror-haunch of

pronghorn   whiteness of whale
of glacial octopus
such thunderous accu-
mulations' drip and roar

snowmelt   sunbreaks   advances
and retreats   the polar
threatener   tossing to
cherry trees by parking

lots unseasonable
nosegays   leaving on wind-
shields these wet billets-doux
the snow is general

***

white, but

not general
but specific
named   particular
otter's brow   scat   leaf print
truck runnel tracks through snow
body's penumbra   and direction
crow that slices sky in two
defining silence   slicing contour
where   before   then   and after
where the world was   or might become
where you are   and are not
who you are   and most definitely   not you
the white world   breath of evanescence
sea forming   convoluted mirth in foam
greyscale   comma   strike
infinitude   murmur   scope

transitory passion

trying to hold to form

from out of forebearance breaks the hymn excelsior

"The ultimate nature of the experience of life is that toil and pleasure, sorrow and joy, are inseparably mixed in it. The very will to life that brought one to light...was a will to come even through pain into this world; else one never would have got here."

Joseph Campbell, Myths to Live By