Gareth Lee

Reflection

 

 

Where we are by the water

we see wind swirling

in the openings

of trees

We see it is good

We scatter

 

bread around but geese

do not come do not

gather

bread bits floating over

 

Geese do not come they

come in daylight

only

 

now it is midnight

 

the President is sleeping

Castro is sleeping

even Whitman sleeps

Whitman with his snoring

sleeping and 

everyone who was drunk 

 

is sleeping and midnight

 

inflates the Capitol

air sticks

like a sleeve

 

 

 

 

Passage

 

 

Ablution falls like light

on ice.  It is why

our eyes will well

when we meet.  It must be

 

like that in love, from what was

said in a schoolhouse,

Maine, to that said at dusk

over broken leaves.  But you

 

your own way and I mine these

past weeks.  Maybe later

love.  For now, here’s a jar

to keep your flower seeds for now in.

 

Here’s wine for the heavy

meals.  All seems to drip.

 

 

 

 

Gareth Lee took his MFA at Brown.  His work has appeared in The Canary, Columbia Poetry Review, Denver Quarterly, First Intensity, GutCult, Northwest Review, POOL, Spinning Jenny, and elsewhere.  He teaches high school literature and composition in New Jersey