The Merwin Conservancy

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“Song of Man Chipping an Arrowhead” by W.S. Merwin

Published in:

Migration: New & Selected Poems, 2005

(Copper Canyon Press)

Little children you will all go
but the one you are hiding
will fly

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The Merwin Conservancy, P.O. Box 809, Ha‘ikū, HI 96708

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Garden Music by W.S. Merwin

In the garden house
the digging fork and the spade
hanging side by side on their nails
play a few notes I remember
that echo many years
as the breeze comes in with me
out of the summer light
they know the notes by now
so well that the music
seems to be going on
all by itself in the shade
of the roof I made for them
half my life ago
and I see the garden now
far away in itself
reflected in the polished spade
as a place I have never been
while the music goes on
echoing the days

Read more poems by W.S. Merwin