The Place of Wild Things

By wild I mean untamed.     Everything
is teaching and being taught, all day,
all night.     I mean the flicker
from another ground, my friend's cat
as the robin descends, that sound
that makes her loving, finicky
human turn her head away.

It isn't food, it isn't instinct.
Molly taking off her shirt to wash
just as we met, particles of signals
filling the room, her fresh smile.
It is what the unlikely don't understand;
the brash possum, the unexpected touch,
the growl of personality, the hope.

Daniel J. Langton's work has appeared in Poetry, Fiddlehead, the Atlantic Monthly, Vallum, The Paris Review, the Times Literary Supplement, and similar journals. His QUERENCIA won the Devins Award for Poetry and the London Prize. His most recent work is LIFE FORMS (Cheltenham) and the SONNETS (California) He lives and teaches in San Francisco.

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