The Lonely Two

Having run free in the earth’s clear air,
we sleep like learning to drown, to fall among fathoms
loose-limbed, at rest. We are weightless in a great
silence alone. Out of the hazy element
around our alien, weed-lost being begin
to move the changing shapes of surprise and terror.
They are shadowy, quiet images of threat, that leave us
to our own fear. Somehow we learn to swim,
to breathe, to move with the wide-eyed
sensuality of fish; and to bear the feel
of our unheard screams. Drifting on the vast floor
of the sea, there is only the self, the lonely self:
part is a fish, subtle bubble of flesh,
risking its way through untried moments:
part is a man who aches to breathe air
and sit among the laughter of bright eyes and sing
on a spring hill. The nets of necessity
move with a slow and insistent grasp of our being,
bringing the hungry man back to his air,
bringing the delicate fish up unaccustomed
heights to burst and drown on the rude beach.