The BlueIris Semi-Nightly Poetry Break, 3/19/08

[BlueIris]

"Punishment"

I can feel the tug
of the halter at the nape
of her neck the wind
on her naked front.

It blows her nipples
to amber beads,
It shakes the frail rigging
of her ribs.

I can see her drowned
body in the bog,
the weighing stone,
the floating rods and boughs.

Under which at first
she was a barked sapling
that is dug up
oak-bone brain-firkin:

her shaved head
like a stubble of corn,
her blindfold a soiled bandage,
her noose a ring

to store
the memories of love.
Little adultress,
Before they punished you

you were flaxen-haired,
undernourished, and your
tar-face was beautiful.
My poor scapegoat,

I almost love you
but would have cast, I know,
the stones of silence.
I am the artful voyeur

of your brain's exposed
and darkened combs
your muscles' webbing
and all your numbered bones:

I who have stood dumb
When your betraying sisters
cauled in tar
wept by the railings,

who would connive
in civilized outrage
yet understand the exact
and tribal, intimate revenge.

—Seamus Heaney

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. My dear BlueIris...

The things we do to women, in the name of morals...

This is brilliant, and heartbreaking...

Thank you...

:cry:

[BlueIris]

2. I've always wondered if Heaney regrets publishing this one.

He did take some heat for these poems back in the day, though it was more for the pro-Republican sentiments (Heaney was—is?—pro-Irish independance) than their misogyny.

[BlueIris]

3. Kick.