The Singer

      For Ethan Canin

I sat on the dock at dusk and spoke

to the fish who swam beneath me

like ears with fins to hear my secrets.

“That words come close?” I whispered.

“The sky enters me like a sword

with my own hand on the hilt.

How to witness what I can't express—

the smell of lilacs, the dirge of loons.

Make up the rest if you wish.

Less is enough.

Say I sound like one of the Hosts.

That I'm crying also and there's nothing

you can do to make me stop.

That I'm like the peepers, katydids, and thrush

with my own song— all call in the opera of dusk. 

Or is it response?”

--Chard DeNiord