More from the Winter 1983 issue of Bridge:



The Pulse

Arthur Sze



A woman in a psychiatric ward

is hysterical; she has to get a letter

to God by tomorrow or



the world will end. Which root

of a chamisa grows and grows?

Which dies? An analysis of



the visual cortex of the brain

cofines your world-view even as you

try to enlarge it? I walk



down an arroyo lined with old tires

and broken glass, feel a pulse,

a rhythm in silence, a slow



blooming of leaves. I know

it is unlikely, but feel I could

find the bones of a whale



as easily as a tire iron.

I shut my eyes, green water flowing

in the acequia never returns.