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Article: SLUGS AMOROUS IN THE AIR.
- Article from:
- Whole Earth
- Article date:
- March 22, 1998
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1998 Point Foundation. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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The spirit moves, Yet stays: ... A small thing, Singing.
THEODORE ROETHKE
On mucous films they glide,
gracefully monstrous:
slick misbegotten whales,
halved, cast out onto land,
shrunken, left to cross forever
the shoreless sea of earth.
Indifferent to us,
these constant voyagers
detecting in each other clues
of readiness--who knows how?
They soar like gradual
eagles up a bank of tree
out onto a dark current
of limb, then dangle
from a single length
of shared umbilicus
high in clear blue
air, spinning
slowly in the globe
of their own motion,
two beings intent
upon each ...