from A Reading (11-17), section 14 for Frances Jaffer hungry the bears in their ferocious aspect throwing up a symptom. garbage in the night a watch one would not awake from. now it rains more or less quietly though a storm had been evoked only moments before a gale at full tilt. the whole chorus of familiars the arching leaves trembling the muttering and nattering all this mothering and fathering in a waystation of the world. power paged and set aside some slow circling back even as I drew the orbit of the seasons moving again to that day when the sun stood still then provoked its head how she has lived for years in the shade of this gnawing and withering going easily even carelessly into it even as I might look up to see her ahead of me walk quietly into the trees as I yet in the full light an upland meadow a little after noon a respite -- Beverly Dahlen San Francisco, January 3--March 18, 1981 This excerpt from A Reading (11-17), Potes & Poets Press. 1989. Other books by Beverly Dahlen include: Out of the Third. San Francisco, Momo's Press. 1974: A Reading 1-7. Momo's Press. 1985; A Reading 8-10. Tucson.1992. go to this issue's table of contents