BREAD AGAIN

Poem for Wednesday, November 19, 2014

BREAD

For Wendell Berry

Each face in the street is a slice of bread   

wandering on

searching

somewhere in the light the true hunger   

appears to be passing them by   

they clutch

have they forgotten the pale caves

they dreamed of hiding in

their own caves

full of the waiting of their footprints

hung with the hollow marks of their groping   

full of their sleep and their hiding

have they forgotten the ragged tunnels

they dreamed of following in out of the light   

to hear step after step

the heart of bread

to be sustained by its dark breath   

and emerge

to find themselves alone   

before a wheat field

raising its radiance to the moon

© W.S. Merwin,

From The Second

Four Books of Poems,

Port Townsend,

Washington,

Copper Canyon Press,

1993