Sonnet III

Stronger than alcohol, more great than song,
deep in whose reeds great elephants decay;
I, an island, sail, and my shores toss
on a fragrant evening, fraught with sadness
bristling hate.
It's true, I weep too much. Dawns break
slow kisses on the eyelids of the sea,
what other men sometimes have thought they've seen.
And since then I've been bathing in the poem
lifting her shadowy flowers up for me,
and hurled by hurricanes to a birdless place
and waving flags, nor pass by prison ships
O let me burst, and I be lost as sea!
and fall upon my knees then, womanly.

-- Ted Berrigan, from The Sonnets

Comments

R.T. said…
My top choice is Iowa as well. I'm reading a book by an Alabama MFA graduate- I can pass it along to you when I finish. She won an Iowa Fiction Award- Jennifer S Davis' Her Kind of Want. They're southern stories.

Anyway, I'm excited- do you have any date/time/place preferences? It could be the two of us or even the four of us. I saw a few pictures of your husband smoking cigars, I think. Michael smokes cigars, too- so let me know what works for you.

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