Lares

All afternoon I have heard you

going from room to room, as if you would offer

the gift of a watchful presence, the gift of a look

to how the sunlight gathers in the folds

of curtains

how the shadows on the wall

flit back and forth, more sparrow, or swallow in flight

than birds would have been.

Like you I have felt it today, that space in our house

where doors might swing open

Messengers appear:

the curve of a bowl, or the red in a vase of carnations

softly assuming the forms of a visitation.

We go for weeks and never catch ourselves

like this, the trace of magic we possess

locked in the work of appearing, day after day,

in the world of our making;

we go for months with phantoms in our heads

till, filling a bath, or fetching the laundry in,

we see ourselves again, at home, illumined,

folding a sheet, or pouring a glass of milk,

bright in the here and now, and unencumbered.

                         —John Burnside  (1955– )

                                                  from  Gift Songs 
                                                         

                                                     Cape Poetry/Random House UK (2007)