The BlueIris Semi-Nightly Poem Thread, 10/08/07

[BlueIris]

"Yesterday"

Just yesterday,
three days after my forty-fifth birthday,
a mild October afternoon,
somewhere around five o' clock
and maybe the seventh or eighth time
I'd gone to check—

Now that it's happened, it seems it had to happen.

Still the house had built itself a corridor I'd been hurrying through
towards the sleeping child,

Thinking of Sarah's angel, hearing Sarah's laugh.

The white curtains billowed slightly in the mild October wind
—but there was no baby, and hadn't been.

—Marie Howe

[BlueIris]

1. Kick.

[fizzgig]

2. this one is very sad

and contrasts amazingly with the other one you picked for tonight

[BlueIris]

3. Strange; I wasn't going for "contrast" when I picked these two.

The bonus was actually selected kinda randomly. One of the only times I've done that; most of the rest of my selections are chosen very deliberately to fit a certain "theme."

[Heidi]

4. Kick.

This is very powerful.

:kick:

[CaliforniaPeggy]

5. This is so powerful, and sad, my dear BlueIris...

The things that dreams, or maybe nightmares, are made of...

:cry:

[BlueIris]

6. I'm hoping to post poems from Marie Howe's new book soon.

Though I still think it's important to distinguish between a poem's speaker's experiences, and those of the author who wrote the poem, I'm going to guess that this poem was based on Howe's own infertility experiences. She has now adopted a daughter, and lives with her in New York City. The new book features a poems whose speakers are raising daughters.

[BlueIris]

7. Kick.