A cortege of clouds’
shifting planes
reflected on a river,
the current’s weave deepens,
yet motionless
the dramatization of
a fern unfolding,
light illuminating the air
for a moment’s threshold,
when time, where we stand,
corresponds to the day
held firm,
derived from the elegance of
the equation
for what was once never here.
Copyright © 2016 by James Brasfield. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on August 10, 2016, by the Academy of American Poets.