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This poem is taken from PN Review 2, Volume 4 Number 2, January - March 1978.

Five Poems Peter Scupham

Under the words, the word. There, for a moment,
Suffusions of slow light welled up and broke
Against unsettled surfaces.

Cadence against cadence. In their cut sheaf
Perdita's daffodils felt each torn spathe
Darken and cool as a deflected shaft
Broke head from stem. Wind set about
The resilient garden with a skirr of snow.
A globe of water on the sill inverted,
Subdued, then held these tiny languages:
Transposed scales of the Camera Obscura,
Aeolian harps, the unforced elements at play.

And now the white page, crowded to the margin-
So little space to write between the lines,
To place, against that weight and density,
The flying stance of wind or daffodil.
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