Table of Contents
Acknowledgments xiii
Introduction Ted Kooser xv
From Work, for the Night Is Coming 1981
Geodes 3
Early Warning 4
For Jack Chatham 5
The Madhouse 6
Walking the Ties 8
Glacier 9
Mississinewa County Road 10
The Oddfellows' Waiting Room at Glencove Cemetery 11
The Undertaker 12
Monument City 14
Work, for the Night Is Coming 15
At the Sign-Painter's 16
Turning the Brick 18
Landing the Bees 19
The Measuring 20
Ginseng 22
Shaking the Peonies 25
Birdstone 26
From After the Rain 1993
After the Rain 29
Phoenix 30
The Gleaning 34
Scryer 36
The Shriving 37
Mississinewa Reservoir at Winter Pool 40
The Purpose of Poetry 41
Poem Written on a Line from the Walain Olum 42
Foundling 44
Barn Siding 46
Cicadas 64
Interview 65
Drawing the Antique 66
For an Old Flame 68
Portrait Studio 69
Cecropia Moth 70
Seed Storm 71
Galleynipper 72
Changeling 74
Mourning Doves 75
The Believers 76
For Starr Atkinson, Who Designed Books 78
From Les Barricades Mystérieuses 1999
Improvisation 81
Summons 82
Candle 83
Berceuse 84
Ditchweed 85
Cemetery 86
Interlude 87
Ford 88
Millefiori 89
Clavichord 90
Tankroom 91
Phosphorescence 92
Palimpsest 93
Labyrinth 94
Linen 95
Reprise 96
Hawkmoth 97
Comet 98
From Cross this Bridge at a Walk 2006
Covered Bridge 101
Visit 116
Recollections of a Contingent of Coxey's Army Passing through Straughn, Indiana, in April of 1894 119
Spirea 121
Picking Stone 126
From A Dance in the Street 2012
Prophet Township 133
Summit 136
Roadside Crosses 138
Fire Burning in a 55-Gallon Drum 139
In the Warehouse District 140
In the Military Park 141
The Pool at Noon 142
Plastic Sack 145
Wind Egg 146
Hidden Door 148
Cicadas in the Rain 149
Sphinx 150
War 151
At the Art Institute 152
Mourning Dove Ascending 155
Up in Michigan 156
Blank Paper 158
Under the Snowball Bush 160
Snow 162
What Is Dream? 164
New Poems
Clouds 167
Schoolhouse 168
Dryad 169
Awakening 170
Homestead 171
Gone 172
Web 173
Etruria 174
Boleyn 175
Vow 176
Cross-harp 177
Torc 178
Ariadne 179
Poetry 180
Perseus 181
Twilight 182
Question 183
Polyxena 184
Graveyard 185
Achilles 186
Mourning 187
Philoctetes 188
Adultery 189
Treadwheel 190
Priestess 191
Moth 192
Journeyman 193
Visitor 194
Prescription 195
Evergreen 196