Castile in  General   

Orange blossoms blowing over Castile
children begging for coins

I met my love under an orange tree
or was it an acacia tree
or was he not my love?

I read this, then I dreamed this:
can waking take back what happened to me?
Bells of San Miguel
ringing in the distance
his hair in the shadows blond-white

I dreamed this,
does that mean it didn't happen?
Does it have to happen in the world to be real?

I dreamed everything, the story
became my story:

he lay beside me,
my hand grazed the skin of his shoulder

Mid-day, then early evening:
in the distance, the sound of a train

But it was not the world:
in the world, a thing happens finally, absolutely,
the mind cannot reverse it.

Castile: nuns walking in pairs through the dark garden.
Outside the walls of the Holy Angels
children begging for coins

When I woke I was crying,
has that no reality?

I met my love under an orange tree:
I have forgotten
only the facts, not the inference—
there were children, somewhere, crying, begging for coins

I dreamed everything, I gave myself
completely and for all time

And the train returned us
first to Madrid
then to the Basque country

By Louise Gluck

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Other poems by Louise Gluck:

• A Fantasy
• All Hallows
• April
• Cana
• Castile
• Celestial Music
• Confession
• Early Darkness
• Elms
• First Memory
• Horse
• Labor Day
• Love Poem
• Lullaby
• Matins
• Midnight
• Nostos
• Parable Of The Dove
• Parousia
• Poem
• Portrait
• Retreating Wind
• Saints
• Siren
• Snow
• Snowdrops
• Summer
• The Butterfly
• The Fear Of Burial
• The Garden
• The Gold Lily
• The Pond
• The Red Poppy
• The Silver Lily
• The Triumph Of Achilles
• The Untrustworthy Speaker
• The White Lilies
• The Wild Iris
• The Wish
• Vespers
• Widows