Island Quarry

Square sheets—they saw the marble into

Flat slabs there at the marble quarry

At the turning of the road around the roots of the mountain

Where the straight road would seem to ply below the stone, that fierce

Profile of marble spiked with yonder

Palms against the sunset's towering sea, and maybe

Against mankind. It is at times—

In dusk it is at times as though this island lifted, floated

In Indian baths. At Cuban dusk the eyes

Walking the straight road toward thunder—

This dry road silvering toward the shadow of the quarry

—It is at times as though the eyes burned hard and glad

And did not take the goat path quivering to the right,

Wide of the mountain—thence to tears and sleep—

But went on into marble that does not weep.