View #45

after Hokusai and Hiroshige

I dreamt half my life was spent
in wonder, and never suspected.

So immersed in the moment
I forgot I was ever there.

Red-tailed hawk turning
resistance into ecstasy.

The patrolmen joking with the drunk
whose butt seemed glued to the sidewalk.

A coral quince blossom in winter,
pink as a lover's present.

And tilting my bamboo umbrella
against the warm slant

of rain, was I not a happy peasant
crossing the great bay on a bridge that began

who knows when, and will end
who knows when.
Credit

From Views from Along the Middle Way by Thomas Centolella is used by permission of Copper Canyon Press. Copyright © 2002 by Thomas Centolella. All rights reserved.