.
What lives? the proper creatures in their homes?
A weed? the white and giddy butterfly?
Bacteria? necklaces of chromosomes?
What lives? the breathing bell of the clear sky?
The crazed bull of the sea? Andean crags?
Armies that plunge into themselves to die?
People? A sacred relic wrapped in rags,
The ham-bone of a saint, the winter rose,
Do these?—And is there not a hand that drags
The bottom of the universe for those
Who still perhaps are breathing? Listen well,
There lives a quiet like a cathedral close
At the soul’s center where substance cannot dwell
And life flowers like music from a bell.
