Ignis Fatuus

In the twilight of my audacity

I saw you flee the world, the burnt highways

Of summer gave up their light: I

Followed you with the uncommon span

Of fear-supported and disbursed eyes.

Towards the dark that harries the tracks

Of dawn I pursued you only. I fell

Companionless. The seething stacks

Of cornstalks, the rat-pillaged meadow

Censured the lunar interior of the night.

High in what hills, by what illuminations

Are you intelligible? Your fierce latinity

Beyond the nubian bulwark of the sea

Sustains the immaculate sight.

To the green tissue of the subterranean

Worm I have come back, two-handed from

The chase, and empty. I have pondered it

Carefully, and asked: Where is the light

When the pigeon moults his ease

Or exile utters the creed of memory?