On Stone
The monks petition to live the harder way,
in pits dug farther up the mountain,
but only the favored ones are permitted
that scraped life.
The syrup-water and cakes
the abbot served me were far too sweet.
A simple misunderstanding of pleasure
because of inexperience.
I pull water up hand over hand
from thirty feet of stone.
My kerosene lamp burns a mineral light.
The mind and its fierceness lives
here in silence.
I dream of women and hunger in my valley
for what can be made of granite.
Like the sun hammering this earth
into pomegranates and grapes.
Dryness giving way to the smell
of basil at night. Otherwise,
the stone feeds on stone,
is reborn as rock,
and the heart wanes.
Athena's owl calling
into the barrenness,
and nothing answering.
Jack Gilbert
Posted over on Slate
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