YOUR DAUGHTER DRAWS OWLS

Careful, indelible, your daughter

draws owls for me

leaning her blonde head

on one inkstained hand

making her white paper a serious garden

The ink runs in groves

& crossed fields. Here in the feathers

she has made a hedge: looking

too closely I see hawthorn

& dog roses: summers

& that fall of owls.

Staring at me now she talks of dances

& the coming rain: here by own eyes

she has made dry roads.

Here is an empty house, & her hair

sweet lantern

& her eyes through the dark

a meticulous clear copy.

this is an old one; came out in kayak one autumn.