Wednesday, November 08, 2006

Paterson: Book Four, Chapter III, p. 191-92













* This poem is the second in a series dealing with the Haitian President of Williams' text. The first part can be read HERE.

Women to the Haitian President, upon Gathering at Dusk near Point Croix


We
who have been your lovers
have talked this through:

Yes,
our beauty is collective.
It is spun
from the sameness of our contours,
it is outlined
in black, gathered
and flocking against
the background of our dusk,
where we have been threaded
over that losing light,
crossed and woven
in darkest silhouette
upon the loom;

and Yes,
the shape of breasts we know
are enough, more than -
doubled and doubling
the smaller joy of your
heart,
so much of us
in pairs
you'd say;

we say
your conclusions could only be
reached this way:
multiplicitly.

But Man,
who loved us each
divided, parts of
a whole seen so
distantly,
great God, what you did not know
in this shadowed shape,
What!

Our eyes;
twinned depths
of night, suns each
setting on waters paired
and equally bottomless.

Dearest man,
I say,
as I, as
I, as
I, as
I:
what love,
love, love,
for this beauty
has been lost?

KMC 11-8-06

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

This space intentionally left blank.

Unknown said...

Huh? Are we taking a test?

brd said...

I have read this poem numerous times since it was posted. It is quite rich in meaning and form. I guess it captures for me a bit of the frustration I see in contemporary society that ignores the depth of fidelity, seeking in multiplicity of experiences what can be found in singleness of heart. Well done Switters.

By the way, I've read this several times because, some persons have not been posting new material. Are we busy?

Kenneth M. Camacho said...

I've been meaning to post a comment explaining the long absence - the answer, however, is predictable: Conversely and I are wrapping up a semester teaching and taking courses, and thus we have been spending far too much grading and writing papers and far too little working on things worth doing. If it encourages anyone, we do have poems in rough form floating about, but full revisions probably cannot be expected until after next Wednesday or so - time collapses.