Pond Song 4.60

The Unequal . . . equalizes itself for the sake of the other. G&B 255

Walden is dull I read it anyway__I return to the pond in sleet

ear-stopping wind but anyway__I shall not get cold feet

dark mystery is overfull__I read that in Wei Ying-wu

the wind dies clouds appear__white in the sudden blue

meanders through stiff stalks__a sparrow flits away

Thoreau had too much hope in him__words mean more than we say

POND SONG 4.59

Our eros for the divine is met with the divine agape for us. G&B 276

under crow calls the pond rises__archipelagoes of ice

drift in the empty spaces__what trouvaille may suffice

words are floating things (Han Yu)__in the dark water between

immense slabs a whiter white__a bufflehead dives unseen

Pond Song 4.58

We are returned to a sort of fertile formlessness. G&B 261

This is Thoreau’s sweet edge__bottom solid milky ice

cuts one happily in two__sunglare on both sides

fact and feeling (Cavell)__the wonder of it is I

hear ducks splashing over there__low tide is still high

Pond Song 4.57

“…flow of the overdeterminate origin in us…” G&B 262

I see out and about myself__Journal 7 January ‘57

solitary vigilant__Thoreau between earth and heaven

nature his divine other__today the pond’s brushed steel

snow crust under my stick__I’m not sure what I feel

rain spots the sketch pad__pencilled notes smeared black

what was there is not now__the bufflehead’s white back

Pond Song 4.56

The primordial origin is not abstract or indefinite, or indeterminate, but overdetermined as overfull. G&B 257

rain seethes at low tide__shallows show the bottom

background roar of the bypass__I start to hum dumb-

struck by a silence out there__ Giacometti-like iron-

y and delicacy of reserve__the spare blue blade of a heron

splendor formae overplus__nothing prepared me for this

David Jones the sun in his face__Meng inured to the process

Pond Song 4.55

In the hyperspace there is an echoing otherness that perplexes one with the voice of another, other beyond all echo. G&B 267

the cold kiss of flakes__I wander to the pond

the Atlantic swells upriver__a lace of snow on the ground

ice drapes the spartina__light brims on the tide

far out in the middle__a few ducks darkly glide

Pond Song 4.54

What must the origin be like given the doubleness, both the arising and the transcience in all passing. G&B 253

distant crows sound horizon__snow crust underfoot

ducks headsdown in silence__tide pools backlit

looking’s just not enough__says Meng Hao-jan

winter light withholds nothing__gives with abandon

Pond Song 4.53

Creation concerns the kind of beings we find in the between, in so far as they show themselves as coming to be. God and the Between, 248.

that they are here at all__just audible over tide-spill

mallards work the mudflats__not mine but Thy will

be done this dark day__sun dull in the shallows

between snowfalls grass rots__it is your excess that hallows

Pond Song 4.51

Being that is no-being is most evident with human being. G&B 263

Snow light gray clarities__pond on the way out
Galvanized pipe in amber weeds__that musical downspout

Emotions are born of habit__E.P. out of Li Po
A bufflehead breaks the surface__its white whiter than snow

Pond Song 4.50

The pan(en)theistic holism stems from the dynamism of becoming towards a perfecting consummation, the hyberbole’s thought of creation stems from the enigma of the arising of becoming itself, in the first place. God and the Between 248

all these little gods__bark of dog yelp of child

mallard’s belly-laugh__are nothing to the wild

brightness of the thaw__mudflats’ sudden green

surplus to what is given__which is not what I mean