Before the last ending of autumn,
A startled cry from inside
Seemed like a mind in its sound.
I knew only what I had heard,
A baby’s cry, at midnight or after,
Above the late November wind.
The moon was rising at two,
Once a crumpled mask above dead leaves . . .
It could not be inside.
Not from the chiaroscuro
Of sleep’s faded paper sky . . .
The moon wasn’t coming inside.
That startled cry—it was
A tone whose song preceded tuning.
It was nothing like the old moon,
Surrounded by its echoic tone
Being right here. It was what
I’ve always known to be real.
Note: This poem is an homage to Wallace
Stevens, and is a rewrite of his
"Not Ideas About the Thing But the Thing Itself."
It's a form of ventriloquism, which is mentioned
in the Stevens poem, shown below.
At the earliest ending of winter,
In March, a scrawny cry from outside
Seemed like a sound in his mind.
He knew that he heard it,
A bird's cry, at daylight or before,
In the early March wind.
The sun was rising at six,
No longer a battered panache above snow...
It would have been outside.
It was not from the vast ventriloquism
Of sleep's faded papier-mache...
The sun was coming from the outside.
That scrawny cry--It was
A chorister whose c preceded the choir.
It was part of the colossal sun,
Surrounded by its choral rings,
Still far away. It was like
A new knowledge of reality.