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You are here: Home / Poems / “Air”, by W.S. Merwin

“Air”, by W.S. Merwin

November 28, 2017 By Merwin Conservancy

west side beach at dusk
Photo by Stehanie Nelson

AIR

Naturally it is night.
Under the overturned lute with its
One string I am going my way
Which has a strange sound.

This way the dust, that way the dust.
I listen to both sides
But I keep right on.
I remember the leaves sitting in judgment
And then winter.

I remember the rain with its bundle of roads.
The rain taking all its roads.
Nowhere.

Young as I am, old as I am,

I forget tomorrow, the blind man.
I forget the life among the buried windows.
The eyes in the curtains.
The wall
Growing through the immortelles.
I forget silence
The owner of the smile.

This must be what I wanted to be doing,
Walking at night between the two deserts,
Singing.

–W.S. Merwin, from his 1963 book The Moving Target, also found in in the newly released collection The Essential W.S. Merwin (2017, Copper Canyon Press), used by permission of the publishers. 

Copyright © 2017 by W. S. Merwin.  


To browse through our archive of previously posted Poems of the Week, click here.

To support the preservation of W.S. Merwin’s legacy and our efforts to preserve his living legacy for future generations, please consider making a tax-deductible donation to The Merwin Conservancy.

 

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