From The Literary Review
WRITTEN IN ILLNESS IN JAPAN
This chronic quease could mean the end of life on earth for me.
To relieve it I walk beneath a crescent moon in the purpleness, in
last brown glow off slow spare clouds hung over the rice and isolated
black stands of pines. It is brisk and mid-October and still green
at the northern tip of Honshu. I don't miss anyone
just now, because the air won't let me, keeps thrusting
down me a naked thrill of being witness
to the close of visible meaning for tonight.
It is all the pleasure which comes to mind as I walk
toward gloam, glad I forgot that camera and will
have to keep this light alive the way I have held myself alive
this far, by continual even desperate refreshment.
