Self Portrait with Spanish Influenza
 

His carpets flowered
a bo sox stocking

smooth as the path
of a hansom

the unseen reality
of the third base line

Artist . . . in the country
Hunter
             in the Adirondacks
 

Ah to lift
the veil of tears

Here is duality
says the newspaper
And here is the one that contains it

The arm of flesh
poor alternative
to stillness

The infinite source of life
is broken into thirds

A sense of proportion
a surrender to higher authority
and the third — a miracle

of sorts

a black hawk
swallowing a fledgling whole