Two poems by Denise Levertov

The Thread

Something is very gently,
invisibly, silently,
pulling at me--a thread
or net of threads
finer than cobweb and as
elastic. I haven't tried
the strength of it.  No barbed hook
pierced and tore me.  Was it
not long ago this thread
began to draw me? Orway back? Was I
born with its knot about my
neck, a bridle?  Not fear
but a stirring
of wonder makes me
catch my breath when I feel
the tug of it when I thought
it had loosened itself and gone.

Primary Wonder

Days pass when I forget the mystery.
Problems insoluble and problems offering
their own ignored solutions
jostle for my attention, they crowd its antechamber
along with a host of diversions, my courtiers, wearing
their colored clothes; cap and bells.
                And then
once more the quiet mystery
is present to me, the throng's clamor
recedes:  the mystery
that there is anything, anything at all,
let alone cosmos, joy, memory, and everything,
rather than void:  and that, O Lord,
Creator, Hallowed One, You still,
hour by hour sustain it.