My love and I are inventing a country, which we <br />can already see taking shape, as if wheels were <br />passing through yellow mud. But there is a prob- <br />lem: if we put a river in the country, it will thaw <br />and begin flooding. If we put the river on the bor- <br />der, there will be trouble. If we forget about the <br />river, there will be no way out. There is already a <br />sky over that country, waiting for clouds or smoke. <br />Birds have flown into it, too. Each evening more <br />trees fill with their eyes, and what they see we can <br />never erase. <br /> <br />One day it was snowing heavily, and again we were <br />lying in bed, watching our country: we could <br />make out the wide river for the first time, blue and <br />moving. We seemed to be getting closer; we saw <br />our wheel tracks leading into it and curving out <br />of sight behind us. It looked like the land we had <br />left, some smoke in the distance, but I wasn't sure. <br />There were birds calling. The creaking of our <br />wheels. And as we entered that country, it felt as if <br />someone was touching our bare shoulders, lightly, <br />for the last time.<br /><br />Larry Levis<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/in-a-country/
