Memory’s green inch—sunlight’s white snow        bright on August pine                needle. Memory’s green        inch—half-moon                in morning sky, the pine        tree on the near hill,its tip taller than the tip        of the distant mountain—                by a green inch. Memory’s        sky blue through branches                of the pine, the ocean        smells of resin when windblows the ocean        through the pines. Or no,                I’m wrong, it is not        snow, it is the morning                dew in afternoon light, so bright        of the August sun—memory’sgreen wish. The man writing poems        points the way with a poem.                The man who asked the way        has disappeared. The deer bounding                away stops to see what        scared it. Some sound. Spareno arrows, sparrows—        sing. I want a wound.                All my life written down        with a pine needle—                memory’s green inch:        I’ve never been closerto that sound than across        a river.