*Pascal's Triangle

By Emily Galvin

First the nothing looks you in the eye.


One the night that wakes me from my sleep.

One the night that wakes me from my sleep.


One the night that wakes me from my sleep.

Two the pear tree standing on a hill
When the grass is black and all the leaves are yellow.

One the night that wakes me from my sleep.


One the night that wakes me from my sleep.

Three the boys that play beneath the bridge,
Laying still like fishes in the rocks:
After sunset, in the rivers’ bones.

Three the girls that walk along the river,
Pulling flowers from the muddy holes:
After sunset, in the rivers’ bones.

One the night that wakes me from my sleep.


One the night that wakes me from my sleep.

Four the glances thrown behind the girl
As she walks along the beach alone
As the wind is lifting out her dress,
Along the boardwalk in the afternoon.

Six the old man sitting on a bench
Watching the rising tide rush in
Listening to the footsteps of the girl
That walks along the boardwalk, along seaside,
Watching the falling tide escape
To the horizon, sitting on his bench.

Four the sounds her shoes make on the boards,
As she walks the beach in afternoon,
As the wind is lifting out her dress,
Walking down the boardwalk all alone.

One the night that wakes me from my sleep.


One the night that wakes me from my sleep.

Five the stages of the morning light
Rising from behind the eastward rocks
Coming over sagebrush towards the fence,
Lighting up the grass and granite gold
In the stages of the morning light.

Ten the shivers of the sleeping eye
Just before the stages of the light
In the nightly endgame that is dawn
Coming over sage and eastern rock
Quivers underneath the sleeping lid
Flutters lashes as the day begins
Just before the sleeper comes to wake
In the nightly endgame that is dawn
Just before the stages of the light
The shivers come into the sleeping mind.

Ten the dreams that come and go in sleep
As the dreamer turns and returns in his bed
The dreams of what was then and what has come,
The dreams that come and go and come again
As the dreamer moves his restless legs
Walking in his mind and pawing at his bed
Tangled in the sheets and running through his head
The dreams of what has come from what was then
As he returns to his turning in his bed
This dreaming fills the senses through the sleep.

Five the fading of the morning stars
Dimming in the first-day blue
Setting, yet a million tiny suns
Beyond the reach of this, our spinning ground
In the stages of the morning light.

One the night that wakes me from my sleep.