There is a boy who is not me.
Who is not me the way a seed is
not the flower, the way a spring is
not the river the way the sky-blue
eggs in the hedgerow are
not the bird.
He sits in the reeds beside
the turn of a river.
I cannot tell what he is thinking
I can no more fathom him than he,
try as he might, could see me far off
in a whole different countryside
sitting again to watch the swifts
and the swallows fly.
Watching the Swifts
