In the Afternoon Men Are Dreaming of the Dark
And the world converges for them such gifts of yes,
a deer spilling round its arrow. O oil, they say,
O crowbars, slung guitar, meat-salt. In the afternoon men leave
& leave a sure finger in the ditch of your knee. Spread
your hair on the curb. How you converge then, stumble
out the sea under their eye. In the afternoon men watch the children
dance in the grass, stir hot soup with a cool blade
in the last of kitchen light. They do things with their
arms in the earth. They do things with their teeth,
swinging a rope of diesel. Ambulances chase them. O gallop,
O bone, O leather. In the afternoon men are three-fourths ship,
one quarter love. How your knees fall. In the afternoon men bury
their temper in a wave of dusk. The light takes it away like a bird’s
slow wing-close. The light lifts it to its pale throat. 