There they were, in conventional prose,

dabbling together in a break in the ice,

unnoticed, unnoticing of the surrounding glass.

The caught train of lightning in the face

of the rising mallard and his brown wife

shook the sun and held the wind

back, while they obliquely swam

nowhere, together, in the distant fun.

for us and for them. For the dead hand

of winter and for all swimming swam.

—William Meyer