I pluck the leaves and print them. See. These are the ligaments of life, sealed from the stamp pad to page, ink ruts the fluted module of the ginkgo, transplanted from chlorophyll to pulp. I guide you through the park entering these designs into your book. But this is only an outline leaf to leaf. Turn the page. We discard them their veins dying in the stain of our proof. And then comes the reversal. The spore of life tracks us. It clasps the wind behind our heels, scraping the concrete with a sound that smothers our hands in a cocoon of grave wrappings. As we walk away to that spindling echo I remember the cave in Spain; the bison propped against the wall tacky as half-coagulated blood after how many thousand years? An animal of life's desire leaning against stone. The fingerprints still wet upon its flank. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...SONNETS FROM THE PORTUGUESE: 20 by ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING THE PROTESTATION by THOMAS CAREW SONG OF THE FLOUR-MILL by EDWIN ARNOLD THE STONECUTTER by VALERY YAKOVLEVICH BRYUSOV TO A FRIEND WANTING WAR by MAXWELL STRUTHERS BURT PRAYER by DAVID HARTLEY COLERIDGE |