Pause awhile and smooth your
finger
Over stones grown whole with
living;
Warm and joyful, soft with loving.
Sit awhile and wonder
Gently.
Down below the water hushes
Quite beyond the reach of time.
The ducks know how it is,
This spring-love.
“Board her, would you? No; not you.”
Angry paddling,
stabbing beak, a swirl
...and harbours
back,
Flushing
cock-sure through the water,
Sooty eye on
her who watches...
Up, then!
here’s my body...
See?
Splashing,
flailing wings of foam,
Elated...
Down.
Swaying stately
in the water,
So...and back,
and so...together.
Gently, then,
downstream.
The bright,
cold flow floods over me
As I sit
wondering.
The ducks know
how it is.
I know.
(1962)
