Saturday, March 17, 2007

Poem for a White Saint Paddy's Day



Snowdrops by Louise Gluck

Do you know what I was, how I lived? You know

what despair is; then

winter should have meaning for you.

I did not expect to survive,

earth suppressing me. I didn't expect

to waken again, to feel

in damp earth my body

able to respond again, remembering

after so long how to open again

in the cold light of earliest spring -

afraid, yes, but among you again

crying yes risk joy

in the raw wind of the new world.

1 comment:

Jason and Shana said...

Hey Kirsten -- Thanks for checking out our blog and letting your readers (more than two, I'm sure!) know about us. FolkFoods is an exciting adventure...
I love this poem by Louise Gluck. I remember hearing that she wrote her book, The Wild Iris, in matter of weeks -- a feat that reminds me of Spring: the potential, the incubation, the overflow. The snowdrops are sending up green shoots in our backyard. Hope Spring is emerging in your corner of the world... Shana