by Ellen Bryant Voigt
The winter field is not
the field of summer lost in snow: it is
another thing, a different thing.
“We shouted, we shook you,” you tell me,
but there was no sound, no face, no fear, only
oblivion-why shouldn’t it be so?
After they’d pierced a vein and fished me up,
after they’d reeled me back they packed me under
blanket on top of blanket, I trembled so.
The summer field, sun-fed, mutable,
has its many tasks; the winter field
becomes its adjective.
For those hours
I was some other thing, and my body,
which you have long loved well,
did not love you.
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ABOUT THE POET ~
Ellen Bryant Voigt is the author of several collections of poetry, most recently Headwaters: Poems (W. W. Norton, 2013); Messenger: New and Selected Poems 1976-2006 (W. W. Norton, 2007); Shadow of Heaven (W. W. Norton, 2002), which was a finalist for the National Book Award; Kyrie (W. W. Norton, 1995), a finalist for the National Book Critic’s Circle Award; Two Trees (W. W. Norton, 1992); The Lotus Flowers (W. W. Norton, 1987); The Forces of Plenty (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 1983); and Claiming Kin (Wesleyan University Press, 1976).
Last updated December 24, 2014