Roy Herndon Smith
Oh! Blessed rage for order, pale Ramon
—Wallace Stevens
Sitting on the stool,
in the dark, in the back room
of the b and b,
I can’t see Mary
dreaming of what I know I
do not know, but feel
as clearly as I
hear the crashing of the sea
on the shore, crickets
singing, and silence
breathing the cosmos in and
out of emptiness.
Bright Wallace, tell me,
if you can, how nothing’s alone—
the velvet unknown
of Mary sleeping,
the rush and quiet of waves,
the crickets’ sharp chirps—
no single one’s rage
for order’s blessed—no sole
artificer sings
the brilliant orange
light shining through ghostly black
demarcations drawn
by leaves and branches
of the hedge onto the night,
songs of crickets in
the stillness, the sea
sighing under the heavens,
Mary lost and found.
dust 