Valentine's Day is the poet's holiday.

When she left me I stood out in the thunderstorm, hoping to be destroyed by lightning. It missed, first left, then right.

a happy birthdaythis evening, I sat by an open windowand read till the light was gone and the bookwas no more than a part of the darkness.I could easily have switched on a lamp,but I wanted to ride the day down into night,to sit alone, and smooth the unreadable pagewith the pale gray ghost of my hand

After YearsToday, from a distance, I saw youwalking away, and without a soundthe glittering face of a glacierslid into the sea. An ancient oakfell in the Cumberlands, holding onlya handful of leaves, and an old womanscattering corn to her chickens looked upfor an instant. At the other sideof the galaxy, a star thirty-five timesthe size of our own sun explodedand vanished, leaving a small green spoton the astronomer's retinaas he stood on the great open domeof my heart with no one to tell.

a storm that walked on legs of lightning,dragging its shaggy belly over the fields.

Mother (fragment)...You asked me if I would be sad when it happenedand I am sad. But the iris I moved from your housenow hold in the dusty dry fists of their rootsgreen knives and forks as if waiting for dinner,as if spring were a feast. I thank you for that.Were it not for the way you taught me to lookat the world, to see the life at play in everything, I would have to be lonely forever.