My fortress has many windows; from this one,
I can tell the tide’s going out, I can see the small, purplish flowers,
further up from the water, that you never stopped calling sea-thistle,
though that’s still not right. The ring of aspens
that surround my fortress, that of course know nothing of east or
west or love when scattered in all its countless definitions,
Refrain
Carl Phillips
Carl Phillips is the author of Then the War, which received the Pulitzer Prize. His next book, Scattered Snows, to the North, will be out in 2024.