issue 35 > poetry > slonimsky

I have to pause to feel my atoms spin,
to flow with physics governing within,
or else reality would merely be
dry words in textbooks.  Here, upon this ridge
commanding twenty miles of woods below,
I ride the view, my atoms’ roll; see a smudge
of black cloud east, forecasting rain or snow
and watch a hawk coast gusts, like waves at sea,
her feathered flesh atomic too, like mine. 
And we’re both cousins to these trees, a lark,
all weather, wind, one falling leaf, an ant
so capable of doing what I can’t:
back-carrying ten times his weight up bark.
The sun itself (atomic-craft).  A fly.  This pine.






Also by Lee Slonimsky:

Chance