Large, gray, sprawled
like an old elephant.
Winter is ending.
Low, sloping roofs are overturned boats
slumbering along the shores of drowsiness.

Twenty years of an oak tree’s life
is burned instantly in a stove.
And eyes meet only by accident
like suburban roads
that intersect in grassy meadows,
like streams that swell their banks,
like hairs on a pillow
after a long illness.

The old elephant’s hoof
tramples the ground
sowing poisonous yellow flowers
in its path
flowers that have no scent at all.