Leonardo, Codice Atlantico 204 v. a
Radiance, heat, image.
The mind passes in an instant
from east to west
and all the great incorporeal things
resemble these closely—
the shrike in its sylvan dive
impaling the mouse devoutly,
the unfolding of bells and heaven
across the campagna,
opinions of popes, the iris of eye
of the dissolute man, his yawn
of no particular hope, a life so planned
on palisades of wet
Sorrento sand, its sea that sunders
tumbling into each demand, impenetrable
to penetrating scope,
played
off a godhead’s circumspect
serenity and stand, darting
among shadows to the high sun, gone
that which was at once, at most
and once again
so close at hand.
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