“In a Country” by Larry Levis

” My love and I are inventing a country, which we

can already see taking shape, as if wheels were

passing through yellow mud. But there is a prob-

lem: if we put a river in the country, it will thaw

and begin flooding. If we put the river on the bor-

der, there will be trouble. If we forget about the

river, there will be no way out. There is already a

sky over that country, waiting for clouds or smoke.

Birds have flown into it, too. Each evening more

trees fill with their eyes, and what they see we can

never erase.

One day it was snowing heavily, and again we were

lying in bed, watching our country: we could

make out the wide river for the first time, blue and

moving. We seemed to be getting closer; we saw

our wheel tracks leading into it and curving out

of sight behind us. It looked like the land we had

left, some smoke in the distance, but I wasn’t sure.

There were birds calling. The creaking of our

wheels. And as we entered that country, it felt as if

someone was touching our bare shoulders, lightly,

for the last time “.