.
A thing too perfect to be remembered:
stone beautiful only when wet.
*
Blinded by light or black cloth—
so many ways
not to see others suffer.
*
Too much longing:
it separates us
like scent from bread,
rust from iron.
*
From very far or very close—
the most resolute folds of the mountain are gentle.
*
As if putting arms into woolen coat sleeves,
we listen to the murmuring dead.
*
Any point of a circle is its start:
desire forgoing fulfillment to go on desiring.
*
In a room in which nothing
has happened,
sweet-scented tobacco.
*
The very old, hands curling into themselves, remember their parents.
*
Think assailable thoughts, or be lonely.
~ Jane Hirshfield
from Poetry (December 2010)
.
