Oct 08, 2005 16:31
“Ways of Conquest” (Denise Levertov)
You invaded my country by accident,
not knowing you had crossed the border.
Vines that grew there touched you.
You ran past them,
shaking raindrops off the leaves - you or the wind.
It was toward the hills you ran,
inland -
I invaded your country with all my
'passionate intensity',
pontoons and parachutes of my blindness.
But living now in the suburbs of the capital
incognito,
my will to take the heart of the city
has dwindled. I love
its unsuspecting life,
its adolescents who come to tell me their dreams in the dusty park
among the rocks and benches,
I the stranger who will listen.
I love
the wild herons who return each year to the marshy outskirts.
What I invaded has
invaded me.