Orion
By James Longenbach
Stars rising like something said, something never
To be forgotten, shining forever--look
How still they are.
Blind hunter crawling
Toward sunrise, then healed.
He opened his eyes to find her waiting
--Afraid--and together they traveled
Lightly: requiring nothing
But a sense that the road beneath them stretched
Forever. At the edge
He entered the water, swam so far
That he became a speck: his body
Washed ashore, then raised to where we see it now--
The belt, the worn-out sword. I'm not
Afraid--
Except that there is nothing beneath us,
No ground without fear. The body vulnerable
--You can look at me--
The body still now, never
Changing, rising forever--stay--
Like something said.
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I have been spoiled sick, I tell you, by Pete Hamill's Forever, following on the heels of Summerland and The Leto Bundle. Am I going to be in the mood to read something as American as The Adventures of Kavalier & Clay in London? Or should I bring James Hetley's The Summer Country? Or should I run out to the bookstore and buy The Da Vinci Code? But that's hardcover and will weigh more to carry!
I suppose I should bring The World of King Arthur, since it's nationally appropriate and I have to review it. But I don't want even to THINK about working. Perhaps I will bring some uncomplicated historical novel to reread, like something by Sharon Kay Penman? Or a biography of Elizabeth I?
Oh, last-minute packing dilemmas...
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