THE LEAVES HRST.

Before this crown.

Comes our history whose beginning is

animal, as old as,

they meet, they fuck, something

else binds them, Let us

not call it.

The man's mouth on mine,

my mouth on the woman, and inside her,

you, inside me, inside. Always--

Capitaine?

The woman first, and what to call

what it was bound us.

Let's not.

The ruin first.

The translation of one sister,

of another the extended

suicide--Yes,

but in what order, before or after

the mother failing

as she has to. Forgive. The mother's mouth

on the relative

stranger's. As we forgive

his on the woman--the mother--, and

inside her. The father first,

both the translation

and the extended leave

of him. Come the gifts, what else

binds him, a boat

of tortoise shell, a watch-

Yes, but in what order, before, after

the green compass,

green as the grass that

--as it has to--it gets lost in,

no wonder 1 can't

find it. The loss

first. Before the double blow,

not the father, but wind he says

he commands also, even absent-

the being struck

once for losing a thing given, once

for crying,

now it's gone.

Before the compass. Before

this crown.

The gift first, only,

so small in the child's hand that was small, blameless, already bound.

CARL PHILLIPS is the author of four books of poetry, most recently Pastoral (Graywolf) and From the Devotions, a finalist for the 1998 National Book Award. He teaches at Washington University in St. Louis. His poetry appeared in the Review in summer '93.