At the end of the last class,
one student stayed behind
to ask a question I couldn’t answer.
His question reminded me of a book
I hadn’t thought of in years—a textbook
that featured two of my poems as examples.
Both poems, dropped from subsequent editions,
had sprung from memories.
Do any poems not spring from memories?
Now it comes back: the chapter with my poems
and many others was called “The Rhythm of Thought.”
Rhythm. Thought.
I weighed these two terms first this way, then that.
The lingering student (what had his question been?)
left, empty-handed, and I was alone
with the thought of rhythm, the rhythm of thought,
the difference between dream and memory,
the difference between poetry and prose.