At dawn when rowboats drum on the dock

ESSAY ON WOOD

              by James Richardson

At dawn when rowboats drum on the dock

and every door in the breathing house bumps softly

as if someone were leaving quietly, I wonder

if something in us is made of wood,

maybe not quite the heart, knocking softly,

or maybe not made of it, but made for its call.

Of all the elements, it is happiest in our houses.

It will sit with us, eat with us, lie down

and hold our books (themselves a rustling woods),

bearing our floors and roofs without weariness,

for unlike us it does not resent its faithfulness

or question why, for what, how long?

Its branchings have slowed the invisible feelings of light

into vortices smooth for our hands,

so that every fine-grained handle and page and beam

is a wood-word, a standing wave:

years that never pass, vastness never empty,

speed so great it cannot be told from peace.  

From The New Yorker  June 9 & 16, 2014.