Look at her, touching his cheekto make a truce, her fingerscool with spring rain;in thin grass, bursts of purple crocus—even here, even at the beginning of love,her hand leaving his face makesan image of departureand they thinkthey are free to overlookthis sadness.

I had lives before this, stemsof a spray of flowers: they becameone thing, held by a ribbon at the center, a ribbonvisible under the hand. Above the hand, the branching future, stems ending in flowers. And the gripped fist—that would be the self in the present.from ‘Formaggio’ in ‘Vita Nova