A knock on the door deep
into night, the door of a house
deep in a field, in trees, not
a house where one would stop
asking for water, for help:
The road to the house winds
over a creek, along a pond,
its dark water swirling
with wind and life. Any
being resting on the boulders
that push out of the pond
would slip into the body
as a figure went past.
Girded by an unseeable
hour, anyone would
pause on the path
to listen at hearing a heave
of mossy liquid slipping
out of oblivion. The same
heavy curtain drapes
over the house, its sleeping
occupants under a spell,
white noise a constant
last exhalation into rooms
where they dream agape
in their shrouds, their dead
appearing as if nothing
is wrong, going on about
what to plant this year,
as if they have not them-
selves been planted
a quarter mile away.