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Post by MoonyLuna on Feb 12, 2009 12:44:52 GMT -5
The roaring alongside he takes for granted. —"Sandpiper" by Elizabeth Bishop
And when, of a given evening, say, an evening laced with storm clouds skirting distance parsed by slanting light,
or when the thick air of an August afternoon by the late approach of just such a storm turns suddenly thin and cool, and the familiar
roaring, for the moment made especially unmistakable by distant thunder, may seem oddly to be answered from within
—that's how it feels, anyway—and when, of a moment, such roaring couples as well with sudden calm—interior, exterior, it hardly matters—
in that fortunate incursion whereby the roar itself is suddenly interred, you might startle to having had a taste of what will pass as prayer,
or a taste, at the very least, of how fraught, how laden the visible is, even as you find a likely figure for its uncanny agency. Sure,
I'm making this up as I go, hoping—even as I go—to be finally getting somewhere. And maybe I am. Maybe I'm taking you along.
Let's say it's so, and say we now commence.
copyright Scott Cairns
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Post by MoonyLuna on Feb 12, 2009 12:45:28 GMT -5
Featured Poet Scott Cairns
Scott Cairns is professor of English and director of creative writing at the University of Missouri. His recent books include: Compass of Affection: Poems New & Selected (Paraclete), Short Trip to the Edge: Where Earth Meets Heaven—A Pilgrimage (HarperOne), and Love's Immensity: Mystics on the Endless Life (Paraclete). He was also a contributor to God with Us: Rediscovering the Meaning of Christmas (Paraclete). In 2006, he was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship.
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