Monday, November 29, 2021

FINALLY by W S Merwin

Finally

My dread, my ignorance, my
Self, it is time. Your imminence
Prowls the palms of my hands like sweat.
Do not now. if I rise to welcome you,
Make off like roads into the deep night.
The dogs are dead at last, the locks toothless,
The habits out of reach.
I will not be false to you tonight.

Come, no longer unthinkable. Lets us share
Understanding like a family name. Bring
Integrity as a gift. something
Which I had lost, which you found on the way.
I will lay it beside us, the old knife,
While we reach our conclusions.

Come, As a man who hears a sound at the gate
Opens the window and puts out the light
The better to see out into the dark,
look, I put it out.


by W S Merwin
taken from Migrations, New and Selected Poems, Pub. Copper Canyon Press.

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