NOAH AT DUSK


Horizon by horizon, the sea had dropped,
and dolphins, quick stitches riding folds of brill,
proved the world could end again; he'd seen, remember,
giraffes' heads bobbing on the swells like flowers

and the last mountain, turned slick last stone,
pitch off its goats. By now the mice, dynastic sailors,
were roistering next to pooled stubs of candle
and the last handfuls of corn. Soon the future would frill

each beak, and his wife, still mucking out stalls
though the others were pressed into portholes
like designs into buttons, would rainbow above him again

as he's hungered a month for her to do. Then this too
would be lost, like the silence just after the rain stops
when all views seem empty, all balance true.


Terri Witek


Noah at Halloween