<html><head></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 16px/normal Helvetica; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 18px; ">Love Calls Us to the Things of the World</span></div><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 18.0px Helvetica"> </p><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">The eyes open to a cry of pulleys, </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">And spirited from sleep, the astounded soul </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">Hangs for a moment bodiless and simple </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">As false dawn.</div><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 18.0px Helvetica"> </p><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">Outside the open window </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">The morning air is all awash with angels.</div><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 18.0px Helvetica"> </p><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">Some are in bed-sheets, some are in blouses, </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">Some are in smocks: but truly there they are. </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">Now they are rising together in calm swells </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">Of halcyon feeling, filling whatever they wear </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">With the deep joy of their impersonal breathing;</div><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 18.0px Helvetica"> </p><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">Now they are flying in place, conveying </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">The terrible speed of their omnipresence, moving </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">And staying like white water; and now of a sudden </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">They swoon down into so rapt a quiet </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">That nobody seems to be there.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">The soul shrinks</div><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 18.0px Helvetica"> </p><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">From all that it is about to remember,</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">From the punctual rape of every blessed day,</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">And cries,</div><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 18.0px Helvetica"> </p><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">"Oh, let there be nothing on earth but laundry, </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">Nothing but rosy hands in the rising steam </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">And clear dances done in the sight of heaven."</div><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 18.0px Helvetica"> </p><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">Yet, as the sun acknowledges</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">With a warm look the world's hunks and colors,</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">The soul descends once more in bitter love</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">To accept the waking body, saying now</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">In a changed voice as the man yawns and rises,</div><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 18.0px Helvetica"> </p><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">"Bring them down from their ruddy gallows; </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">Let there be clean linen for the backs of thieves; </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">Let lovers go fresh and sweet to be undone, </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">And the heaviest nuns walk in a pure floating </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">Of dark habits,</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; ">keeping their difficult balance."</div><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 18.0px Helvetica"> </p><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 18px/normal Helvetica; "><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>- Richard Wilbur</div></body></html>