"Listening to Myself" by Al Purdy

see myself staggering through deep snow
lugging blocks of wood yesterday
an old man
almost falling from bodily weakness-
look down on myself from above
then front and both sides
white hair - wrinkled face and hands
it's really not very surprising
that love spoken by my voice
should be when I am listening
ridiculous
yet there it is
a foolish old man with brain on fire
stumbling through the snow-

the loss of love
that comes to mean more
than the love itself
and how explain that?
- a still pool in the forest
that has ceased to reflect anything
except the past-
remains a sort of half-love
that is akin to kindness
and I am angry remembering
remembering the song of flesh
to flesh and bone to bone
the loss is better