SHORT POEMS AND SPIN-OFFS: EMILY AND THE EXPERIENCE OF SURPRISE
by Denise Levertov
Page 13
And I'm going to finish up with four poems from Oblique Prayers, which was my last book. First, a poem called "Decipherings" which is actually in four very short parts. I dedicated it to Guillevic, A French poet whom I had translated some years ago because I felt some affinity of form and style with his poetry, although, unfortunately he can't read English.
DECIPHERINGSi.
When I lose my center
of gravity
I can't fly:
levitation's
a stone
cast straight as a lark
to fall plumb
and rebound.
ii.
Half a wheel's
a rising sun:
without spokes,
an arch:
half a loaf
reveals
the inner wheat:
leavened
transubstantiation.
iii.
A child
grows in one's body,
pushes out and
breaks off:
nerves
denying their
non-existence
twist and pinch
long after:
after that otherness
floats
far,
thistledown engine,
up an
over
horizon's ramparts.
iv.
Felt life
grows in one's mind:
each semblance
forms and
reforms cloudy
links with
the next
and the next:
chimes and gamelan gongs
resound:
pondering,
picking the tesserae,
blue or
perhaps vermilion,
what one aches for
is the mosaic music
makes in one's ears
transformed.
