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david yezzi

ix
A green island draped in volcanic smoke,
imperceptible at first, until the reek
of musk wafts to us seaward over a league,
like the pong of love-sheets a summer night has soaked,
retaining, in the after-dawn, the very smell
that brought the madness on. All this we know
before the misted hills float into view.
The fact of land’s not what your dreams foretell,
it’s bitter law, a wafer on the tongue:
we are not suited to live long at see.