Augenblick
       

By the drainpipe beneath the viburnum, just
giving way to small white flowers, the open eye
of a dead robin, wherein the sun, miniscule,
burns through a cloud just above the green
clubs of trees. —Focus sharper in the half shade,
view behind which flight is drowned, two
glances: mine, and its—gone, though a tiny gong
of light still lingers, one I must squint to see,
while the red arm of a wound, its wing will
not veer, never, except into a closer far.
I remember Katherine now. We once kissed
in a barn, then sucked greasy yolks from eggs.
She married a doctor. I threw rice toward long
white veils. Some things you can never hold.
Two glances and a river between no one can
see, and waves like hands, frothy, clapping, near.

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Copyright © 2013 Mark Irwin All rights reserved
from Large White House Speaking
New Issues Poetry & Prose
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission