The Rose

Robert Creeley

Into one's self come in again,
here as if ever now to once again begin
with beauty's old, old problem never-ending--

Go, lovely rose... So was that story told
in some extraordinary place then, once upon
          a time so old
it seems an echo now as it again unfolds.

I point to me to look out at the world.
I see the white, white petals of this rose
           unfold.
I know such beauty in the world grows cold.

The 2River View, 2_2 (Winter 1998)

Francesco Clemente