An Interlude: A Poem

After Midnight: Kidney Pond


After midnight I woke up,
shook off sleep and stumbled
out of the cabin into the darkness
that was—amazing!—full of light.

The whole sky was spread before me
twice: the white spool of the moon, a few
milky blue-grey clouds, and a thousand stars
drifted above the pond and in the pond

without distortion. Then some faint breath
of wind or gentle fish ripple
wobbled the moon, and two
glittering threads traveled across the dark

silk of the pond—two luminous strands unraveled
from the spool of the moon. The air was chill
and damp; the beckoning of sleep
a warm cocoon. Even so

I lingered in the clear air, alone
and happy, an accidental witness
of this dazzling secret, this
extravagant beauty opening in the dark

after midnight—unfolding one way or
another every night, for no one
in particular, even for
no one at all.