Little Blessing for My Floater

After George Herbert

This tiny ruin in my eye, small
flaw in the fabric, little speck
of blood in the egg, deep chip
in the windshield, north star,
polestar, floater that doesn't
float, spot where my hand is not,
even when I'm looking at my hand,
little piton that nails every rock
I see, no matter if the picture
turns to sand, or sand to sea,
I embrace you, piece of absence
that reminds me what I will be,
all dark some day unless God
rescues me, oh speck
that might teach me yet to see.

Jeanne Murray Walker is a poet, playwright, and professor of English at the University of Delaware.

From Helping the Morning: New and Selected Poems (Word Farm Press, 2014). Used with permission.

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