Frog

/ Issue 13.3 /

Whenever I approach the frogs,
………….after the night sky has drifted

up from the bottom of the pond,
………….they all go still, invisible, mute,

as if song were light and silence shadow
………….and their fragility my own.

So this is how death must feel,
………….leaning in to touch a child’s face

who vanishes, as nightmares do,
………….before the light can see them.

Far as I know, the frogs are the story
………….their chirping tells, and I

believe, seeing at the water’s edge
………….only stars where I dare not step,

hearing in every corner of the park
………….the pulse that dims to take me in.

Bruce Bond

Bruce Bond

Bruce Bond is the author of thirty-four books including, most recently, Patmos (Juniper Prize, UMass, 2021), Behemoth (New Criterion Prize, 2021), Liberation of Dissonance (Schaffner Award for Literature in Music, Schaffner, 2022), and Invention of the Wilderness (LSU, 2023), plus two books of criticism Immanent Distance (U. of Michigan, 2015) and Plurality and the Poetics of Self (Palgrave, 2019).  Among his forthcoming books are Therapon (inspired by Emmanuel Levinas and co-authored with Dan Beachy-Quick, Tupelo) and Vault (Richard Snyder Award, Ashland).  Presently he teaches part-time as a Regents Emeritus Professor of English at the University of North Texas and performs jazz and classical guitar in the Dallas/Fort Worth area.
Bruce Bond

Also by Bruce Bond (see all)

Author: Bruce Bond

Bruce Bond is the author of thirty-four books including, most recently, Patmos (Juniper Prize, UMass, 2021), Behemoth (New Criterion Prize, 2021), Liberation of Dissonance (Schaffner Award for Literature in Music, Schaffner, 2022), and Invention of the Wilderness (LSU, 2023), plus two books of criticism Immanent Distance (U. of Michigan, 2015) and Plurality and the Poetics of Self (Palgrave, 2019).  Among his forthcoming books are Therapon (inspired by Emmanuel Levinas and co-authored with Dan Beachy-Quick, Tupelo) and Vault (Richard Snyder Award, Ashland).  Presently he teaches part-time as a Regents Emeritus Professor of English at the University of North Texas and performs jazz and classical guitar in the Dallas/Fort Worth area.