.......from Amos Oz in Fima

I sleep
insensible, my sleep untainted with falsehood
unperturbed by roisterous dreams
unconscious to the sufferings of the wakened world
oblivious to the neighborhood dogs, howling
at the moon, caterwauling cats
on backyard fences.

Awake, I am caught up
in the busy-ness of the ordinary,
humdrum tum-te-tum, this and that.
I hear the voices of others
in argumentation, but pay no attention.
Newspapers. Television. Cellular phones.
DoubleyouDoubleyouDoubleyou Dot.
The ether crackles.
What do they want? What's all the clamor?
I throw the papers in the recycle bin,
Turn all the buttons to OFF.

But then it is September morning
and I am out early. The air, cool
portends autumn-- "a revenance of field
and orchard air"-- the light still yellowish,
suffused, suffused within me, provoking
a precious nugget of inner warmth.

A flock of birds, early migrators, wheels
confusedly, and ending commotion,
comes to rest on a wire, perched
in linear array, side by side, shoulder to shoulder.
Arisen from chaos, order.

I am earth, primordial and pure.

.....................................................Israel Lewis

Quotation is from Richard Wilbur, "The Elegy Season."