The Ribbon of the Bell Slipped her stockings straight And fluttered to the choir below And tied herself to the countertenor Leftmost in the frontmost row. I saw her path before she even fell And that is why I stood beneath the bell And from the bottom up, Its details stark and doubted Ignite an uproar in stained-gla** And sound the trumpets of vanity With knowledge of a monument erased I'm the woodpecker on the chimney Digging at the wrong stone But blithely shaking off an ordinary brown Those faded feathers somersaulting low across the road