("Be still, for surely we are the most...")

YVES BONNEFOY + GALWAY KINNELL

But let her be silent, the one still watching

On the hearth, her face having fallen in the flames,

Who still remains seated, being without body.

Who speaks for me, her lips being shut,

Who gets up and calls me, being without flesh,

Who goes away leaving a drawing of her head,

Who still is laughing, in laughter being dead long ago.

Be still, for surely we are the most

Shapeless of the night's gravitating roots,

Cleansed matter going back to the ancient

High-sounding ideas from which the fire has died,

Eroded face of a blind presence

Driven out along with the fire, servant of a house,

And word that has been lived but infinitely dead

Now that the light has become wind and darkness at last.

Structure

16 lines · 5 stanzas