New Directions Books
Living
The fire in leaf and grass
so green it seems
each summer that last summer.
The wind blowing, the leaves
shivering in the sun,
each day the last day.
A red salamander
so cold and so
easy to catch, dreamily
moves his delicate feet
and long tail. I hold
my hand open for him to go.
Each minute the last minute.
Levertov, Denise. Selected Poems. New Directions Books. New York, 2002.
Post-it footnote: You can taste and see how my impoverished imitation pales in comparison to the light of the original. Well, at best, my "flip-side of the same coin" poem "Dying: After Denise Levertov's 'Living'" is trying to have a good-natured, hopefully, prayerful conversation with this particular source of inspiration and consternation. But I do ask myself this question once again: Have I left the green grounding too early? Stretched my wings and taken flight prematurely?
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