Galway Kinnell

Here’s a poem by Galway Kinnell (February 1, 1927 – October 28, 2014), American poet who won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for his 1982 collection, “Selected Poems”.

The Breath of Night

The moon rises. The red cubs rolling
In the ferns by the rotten oak
Stare over a marsh and a meadow
To the farm’s whit wisp of smoke.

A spark burns, high in heaven.
Deer thread the blossoming rows
Of the old orchard, rabbits
Hop by the well-curb. The cock crows

From the tree by the widow’s walk;
Two stars, in the trees to the west,
Are snared, and an owl’s soft cry
Runs like a breath through the forest.

Here too, though death is hushed, though joy
Obscures, like night, their wars,
The beings of this world are swept
By the Strife that moves the stars.

--Galway Kinnell