Poem for Joanna

                                 How can I tell of my silence?   with words?

a radio telescope

gaunt contraption of sheds

& very many grids of cable

imagine a telescope dish

            the diameter of the earth

imagine probing the furthest areas of the universe

            energy

            as in quasars

                        suns

& my sun

my ENERGY                        bursts

a crescendo

            is a quasar

                        a thing of legend

but quietly goes the air

mushrooms in dank places

lightened by dawn

Joanna has never heard the sonic hiss

there is a smell of breakfast

a stream leaping down stones

which among the grasses is the ancient one?

the keeper of grass legend

or among water             which drop?

Joanna

your legs are beautifully long

            but you are too big for Rodin

come at me

            I say you are too big

                        but Rodin is dead anyhow

                                    perhaps of lesser legged women

I talk thus when I am tired

or I am enigmatic

                        later I will try to find

                        heron imagery

my verse will walk on stilts

my arm on white stains black

I write my blackness with light

were I no poet

            an astronomer I'd be

& I would hunt

for quark