(after David Daniel, Seven Star Bird)

A dragonfly
set down on the cover of your book,
the one I was reading
that whole morning
for inspiration.  It was
on the arm of my chair, nearly
out of sight.  I’d been
looking in it for something I could not find
in myself
that morning,
some kind of word or
cliff; maybe even
a seven-star bird.  The sun is just
that way today:
honeyed, benignant, the
world, too: absence
of wound.  And then—

this mineral shiver, this weight-
lessness; a needle
sideways
to the heart. 
And as quickly

it was gone.