14.

Breath, too, can plummet, magic rougher

Than the stars, the sun in the azure

I remember from the morning: you were

Mutinous that nature would winter

Our bones, flatten us like some ridiculous

Rhyme or run-on line youth had turned

In the face of age. I am struck with dumb

Stillness in the wood: here our breath

Is a clear fog in the clean air, our fears

Hear our hearts in our breath, the oaks

Shooting in the leaf-dazzle of autumn

And a storm is around the corner.

Their words are gorse and thorn our hearts

In the day-night of the confusion we parse.