[In the Empire of Light]

By Michael Palmer b. 1943 Michael Palmer

In the Empire of Light

the water’s completely dry

floating on a surface of itself

around islands pointed south-southwest

The wind fills it then

with more of itself

according to the rules

which cause parallel lines

to vibrate and cross

less and less

among the hanging baskets from a rain forest

among the visiting statesmen

from a rain forest

Here the dancer stops

to regain her balance

and reelaborate the distance

from the feet to the head

The risk is a part of the rhythm

She steps out of

and into balance

with those who are left

Chalk-marks show them where to stand

Michael Palmer, "[In the Empire of Light]" a part from The Book Against Understanding from The Lion Bridge: Selected Poems 1972-1995. Copyright © 1998 by Michael Palmer. Used by permission of New Directions Publishing Corporation.

Source: The Lion Bridge (New Directions Publishing Corporation, 1998)

Biography

Michael Palmer was born in New York City and educated at Harvard in the early 1960s, where he encountered Confessional poetry. His opposition to Confessionalism found root in a developing poetics when he attended the landmark 1963 Vancouver Poetry Conference, a three-week gathering where he met Robert Duncan, Robert Creeley, and Clark Coolidge. Correspondence with those three poets greatly influenced Palmer’s early development . . .

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