silences of snail in my garden
not as of

and in what state of mind do
I then kill them one after one 
sometimes three or five in a morning
indifferent to their claim
godlike and in the deepening heat
toward noon
steadily unerratic
stolid

I do not hunt
they are always there
but as I come upon them my gesture pre-
cedes any shaped thought
I brush
downward and then step on and past each

the brittle crunch
against the ground
however
impinges

	*****

just as, in the Brewster's garden, 
twenty-eight years ago,
the water from the dolphin-carried child
impinged on the bronze basin
rippled to the experimenting hand
sent a plaintive note to the darker greens 
which held summer long and secretly
touched by the sound
but allowing no further movement 
inward, summer stabile
without echo
holding voices idly in the distance

	*****
and the sound I make of snail
forces me to name 
what I do.

the sounds of my gestures
after all
have brought me
reluctantly
to