Painting by Paul Brent
In the dining room
there is a brown fish
hanging on the wall who swims along
in his frame while
we are eating dinner.
He swims in candlelight for all to see,
as if he has been swimming forever,
even in the darkness of the ink
before someone thought
to draw him and the thin reeds waving
in his stream and the clear pebbles
strewn upon the sand.
No wonder he continues his swimming
deep into the night,
long after we have
blown out the candles
and gone upstairs to bed.
No wonder I find him
in the pale morning
light, still swimming,
still looking out at me
with his one, small,
spellbound eye.
Billy Collins
Posted over on Poetry Foundation
No comments:
Post a Comment