James A. Hawley
	from Vezelay                   A brebis tondue Dieu mesure le vent.       Ash trees were just leafing out Along the Rue de Rivoli The one window in our   Room on the third floor Overlooking the boulevard Opening out on them.   I thought I saw you That Palm Sunday In front of the église   Across the street Handing out sprigs Of boxwood to the devout.   A highway runs by the roadhouse At the bottom of the hill & it was there we learned you’d   Just passed through not Long ago, had in fact Taken a room in that very   Establishment & stayed the night Howling at a moonless sky A vocalization tempered   By vin au cassis & Leffe, hills Thrilling to the hint of schwa Praying in your own way   For the Intercession of Mary. We’d heard the rumors Imagined them as if   They were true: three Incan Mummies found on the slopes Of a dormant volcano   Whispering of capac cocha – Human offerings— Your familiarity with pangwe   A Bantu language spoken By the Fang of the Ogawe basin Known for their sculpted   & painted religious masks; Your knowledge of the Arabic Qasida: the erotic prelude;   An account of a desert journey & the panegyric proper. After having fed on her kill   A goshawk shows her satisfaction ‘With feaking, jetting, rowsing & such like joyous shews & signes   Of inward pleasure & contentment.’   I thought it “defective” when you Wrote “defunctive.” You also wrote:   “The locals seem to speak A dialect of Ro, a language That rejects all existing words   & roots & is based on an analysis & classification of ideas, analogous To Aristotle (though unspeakably more complex)   For which there is no dictionary & is, in fact, simply an Idea for a language.”                              ***     Immutable mutterings of row-de-dows & barristers Greet the mourners who’ve wandered in, looking For a chance to forget the past or practice   A new-found language with native speakers. The latter resound in the depth & quality Of their abundance & the uncanny   Ability to haunt the wanderings Of even the staunchest ghosts -- Mutterings & incantations   Discernable between steins & pints Of session beer & other strangely- Colored liquids. The wainscoting   Seems to be made of teak or bone; The floor, alternating hexagonal tesserae Of black & white. Amorphous wall hangings   Done up in russets, ochers, burgundy & Maraschinoes, realms of non-spectral color Distinguished by complimentary wavelengths:   Luminance & purity Exonerated by splashes of something Greyish yellow, greener & duller than chamois   Slightly greener & less strong Than old ivory & greener & duller Than flax, the name of which we were   To learn later. The drapes could be made Of pages from a book; the ceiling Stibnite; the doors, a hoax.   We’ll pilgrim after you on the relic-trail before time Wears thin or the scent grows cold. For now, cool intoxicants seep down our   Weepy throats & we don’t know if we should be Affrayed or interrogated by the crowd of foreign- Speaking people at the end of the bar   Their indecipherable clamor enough To un-nerve the nerveless Or wake the dead   From whom we’ve much to learn Which is why we track you as you lead Us about the French countryside:   Riverways & canals, deforested Hillsides, browning vineyards, country Lanes lined with plane trees, the rich   & storied history of quarries & stoneyards; The dead sunk in the muck at Verdun Rolling for miles in clean rows at Normandy   The face of God gloaming in every Country church & cathedral, every Cemetery, war monument & parish graveyard.