A Roadside Epiphany

Not pausing as, in early evening,
I pass a stand of spring-white cherry trees,
I set it spinning anyway, a whirligig—

a thing, a dizzy space—inside-outside
my head: such galaxies, sea-runs of old light
seen faster close,

some distant eddies slowing, some
almost stopped, in a parallax enchantment
of grace-filled dance.

And having passed, I say of each
gray branch—gray presence while it lasts
dissolving into night—let it be shadow

of the brightness it holds, let it be
what first I understood: bone of the world
in cold bloom. It is good.