New.

Waterhouse, Ophelia, 1889

Unbind my hair, she says. The night is white and warm,

the snow on the mountains absorbing the moon.

We have to get there before the music begins, scattered,

elliptical, needing to be drawn together and sung.

They have dark green voices and listening, there are birds,

coal shovels, the glazed hysteria of the soon-to- be-dead.

I suspect Jesus will return and the surprise will be

fatal. I'll ride the equator on a whale, a giraffe on land.

Even stone when inscribed bears the ecstatic. Pressed to

some new wall, ungiving, the screams become thinner.

Let us have the tambourine and guitars and forests, fruit,

and a new sun to guide us, a holy book, tracked in new blood.

Jim Harrison

On to the Oyster Months ...