A Northern Bank

My kind is doomed
but since when was I a partisan of men?
My country is ruined
but since when was I a patriot?

My loyalties
are elsewhere. To the violet
swell of the sky against the east:

to the long pull of words
muttered by soldiers going
to pile their bones by the lake.

I have Du Fu for company,
and Ovidius Naso; 
you could travel further
and do worse.

Here on the desolate shore
the geese in desperate strength
lurch into the air, 
grunting and bleating
laboring and creaking
with the weight of wings and wind:
doomed like the rest
but clear on what they want:

A quiet shore,
and a partner to glide
a wings-length behind and a hand to the right
into the shadow of a northern bank.