Fable

We exclaim in the margins
of books; which is to say

so often it is difficult to escape
what ordinary days bring.  

Hasn't another moon-
viewing festival  quietly 

slipped by, though we can't
leave off putting different kinds 

of filling into skins we will make 
all year? What does it mean 

to leave or to stay, to want
sweetness instead of making

do? I am still asking for stories
that can show the way into

the dark, that can tell apart
what beckons like danger

and what breathes like a warm
fire. A house can be restless

as a mouth not done feeding
itself. A house with an egg-

yolk moon over it, a forest
of beautiful braided trees;

a chorus of waterbirds calling
from one edge to another.