It
is a garden inside a city I will have remembered,
And three small pools I will remember having imagined
As gracing the top of an undistinguished eminence
Not too high in that park. Lying now in the grass,
Cool in the light of July on a :green sward long past
Burns's Lawn, we fasten our tired gaze, she and I,
Across the trees to the west, framing our world in a vast
Moment of stillness. This night, this newly darkened sky,
This scarred park rolling out behind us,
Even this city itself, are ours, wholly unshared
Because unremembered except by both of us, who have made
Light come into darkness, graces dance on a bare
Hilltop, a cycle of months spin around on a frail
Wheel of language and touch. 0 see the light! As a blaze
Of cloud above the western towers gleams for an instant
Up there! Firing the sky, higher than it should be able
To reach, a single firework launched from the unseen river
Rises and dies, as we kiss and listen.
John Hollander
