My Wailing is the Autumn Wind
My wailing is the autumn wind, spilt water
when it fell. Here everything is cool,
unhidden in the rains of May.
There is no sign in the cicada’s cry.
A crow is perched on a bare branch
quite unaware of last night’s storm.
I have not lain with beauty all my life
where ferns fell away in the broken air
of the immigrant’s dream come too true.
The trees along the river are what I see,
where the red hills, dotted with piñon,
declaim their dying. To darken nature
and be summer woods in leaves no
steps had trodden black, to stay our
minds on and be staid for him to conquer.
Because I weep in the tombed
studio, I demand that the human race
be said to weep when weather howls
with tongues that talk all tongues.
