Besides having a great mind, Jefferson had a great ego—also for good and ill.

'The Enthusiast,' by Jon Sweeney

On the first day, I didn’t know it was the first day.

Home water, why?Cold sunlight, new heavenstrikes the shallows of white,wavering tissue, new earth.They are here,gaining the still pool,a million salmon bones.Soul flood. Head down.Study this hieroglyph, stunned. Metal-skinned swimmerscrash from the hurtling channelto this blinding delta,where m

A flicker in the woodsyet enduring as those trees.This twice-spawned leafmakes you believe youcan almost catch lightin your hands. Whatever rootit takes depends on what footbecomes a flower. Brief bliss, whose moth life holdsclose to the flame, this little wormwith wings, so that time may showu

Come, let me strain the raspberriestonight, stir the sauce—glassy the sugar,not too tart—pour it, wipe up the crimsonislands and returnto where I learned the revenueof taste. Taste that’s acquired an appetitefor place, rich with accrued mobilities:sun on the slender sill at early d