Elizabeth Bishop




Late Air

From a magician's midnight sleeve
the radio-singers
distribute all their love-songs
over the dew-wet lawns.
And like a fortune-teller's
their marrow-piercing guesses are whatever you believe.

But on the Navy Yard aerial I find
better witnesses
for love on summer nights.
Five remote lights keep their nests there; Phoenixes
burn quietly, where the dew cannot climb.

spoken = Eye'z