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 is the author of twenty-eight books including, most recently, Blackout Starlight: New and Selected Poems 1997-2015 (E. Phillabaum Award, LSU, 2017), Rise and Fall of the Lesser Sun Gods (Elixir Prize, Elixir Press, 2018), Frankenstein’s Children (Lost Horse, 2018), Dear Reader (Parlor, 2018), Plurality and the Poetics of Self (Palgrave, 2019), Words Written Against the Walls of the City (LSU, 2019), Scar (Etruscan, 2020), Behemoth (New Criterion Prize, Criterion Books), The Calling (Parlor, 2021), and Patmos (Juniper Prize, UMass, 2021).His work has appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, including seven editions of Best American Poetry.Presently he is Regents Emeritus Professor of English at the University of North Texas.
