H. L. Davis

From “To the River Beach”

THE BUSHES have borne few berries, scarcely a color

That hangs against the rocks and dips when the wind,

Aimed against the low branches, bows them to the root.

Back of this poor river country the grain is housed;

And blackbirds, going to eat a little dropped grain,

Hurry from the cold beaches. What must begin

But thoughts of my friends yonder: of such a life,

And of such a man’s body. One Laura, who is my friend,

Whose throat is round without shadow, and the warmth

Is like fire upon the eyes; Italian woman, dark-haired

Worker in the bearing vines—I envy them

Who know how your breast shaped, who measured you

From little to tall woman.
Riding brings me much

Among the dead plants and through the shedding vines:

These lives I know of—the mouths underground,

Roots’ mouths, that since summer are useless, and have died.

So the wild gourds turn yellow upon their black stems,

Drop, and presently that fruit opens to the seed.

Laura, Italian over whose vines the blackbirds fly,

It is longer than this knowledge is old since you came

Through the dead and frosty vineyard to my side.