i get that reassuring feeling
of wanting to escape
I’m Going to Georgia
FOLK SONG
I once loved a young man as dear as my life,
And ofttimes I told him I’d make him his wife.
I’ve fulfilled my promise, I made him his wife
And see what I’ve come to by being his wife.
I’m going to Georgia,
I’m going to roam,
And if ever I get there,
I’ll make it my home.
My cheeks were once red, as red as a rose,
But now they are as pale as the lilies that grow;
My children all hungry and crying for bread;
My husband, a drunkard, Lord, I wish I were dead!
Come, all young ladies, take warning by me:
Never plant your affections on a green, young tree;
For the leaves will wither and the buds they will die;
Some young man might fool you as one has fooled I.
They’ll hug you, they’ll kiss you, they’ll tell you more lies
Than the cross-ties on the railroad or the stars in the skies;
They’ll tell you they love you like stars in the West
But along comes corn whiskey; they love it the best.
Go, build me a cabin on the mountain so high
Where the wild birds and turtledove can hear my sad cry.
A Type of Loss
INGEBORG BACHMANN
Jointly used: seasons, books and music.
The keys, the tea cups, the breadbasket, sheets
and a bed.
A dowry of words, of gestures, brought along,
used, spent.
Social manners observed. Said. Done. And always
the hand extended.
With winter, a Vienna septet and with summer I’ve
been in love.
With maps, a mountain hut, with a beach and
a bed.
A cult filled with dates, promises made
as if irrevocable,
enthused about Something and pious before Nothing,
(—the folded newspapers, cold ashes, the slip of paper
with a jotted note)
fearless in religion, as the church was this bed.
From the seascape came my inexhaustible painting.
From the balcony, the people, my neighbors,
were there to be greeted.
By the fireplace, in safety, my hair had its most exceptional
color.
The doorbell ringing was the alarm for my joy.
It was not you I lost,
but the world.
On Monsieur’s Departure
QUEEN ELIZABETH I
I grieve and dare not show my discontent,
I love and yet am forced to seem to hate,
I do, yet dare not say I ever meant,
I seem stark mute but inwardly do prate.
I am and not, I freeze and yet am burned,
Since from myself another self I turned.
My care is like my shadow in the sun,
Follows me flying, flies when I pursue it,
Stands and lies by me, doth what I have done.
His too familiar care doth make me rue it.
No means I find to rid him from my breast,
Till by the end of things it be supprest.
Some gentler passion slide into my mind,
For I am soft and made of melting snow;
Or be more cruel, love, and so be kind.
Let me or float or sink, be high or low.
Or let me live with some more sweet content,
Or die and so forget what love ere meant.
The Eaten Heart
from The Knight of Curtesy
“Make it sweet and delicate to eat
For it is for my lady bright.
If she guessed what was in this meat
Her heart would not be light.”
The lord’s words were truly spoke
The meat of woe and death
The lady did not know it though
And followed him across the hearth.
And when the lord sat down to eat
His lady at his side
The heart was served upon the plate
But it had grief inside.
“Madame, eat of this,” he said,
“For it is dainty and pleasant.”
The lady ate and was not dismayed
For of spice there was not want.
When the lady had eaten well
To her the lord said there,
“His heart you have eaten every morsel
Of your knight to whom you gave a lock of hair.
“As you can see, your knight is dead;
Madame, I tell you certainly.
That is his heart on which you fed.
Madame, at last we all must die.”
When the lady heard the words he said
She cried, “My heart shall rend
Alas, I ever saw this day
Now, please God may my life end.”
Up she rose with heart of woe
And straight to her chamber went;
She confessed devoutly so
That shortly she received the sacrament.
Mourning in her bed she lay
So pitiful was her moan.
“Alas, my own dear love,” she said,
“Since you are dead, my life is gone.
“Have I taken your heart in my body
That meat to me is dear;
For sorrow alas I now must die
A noble knight without fear
“With me thy heart shall surely die
I have received the sacrament;
All earthly food I shall deny
In woe and pain, my life is spent.”
Her complaint was piteous to hear.
“Goodbye my lord forever;
I die as true a wife to you
As any could be ever
“I am chaste of the knight of curtesy
And wrongfully are we brought to confusion
I am chaste of him and he of me
And of all other save you alone.
“My lord, you were to blame
For making me eat his heart;
But since it is buried in my body
I shall never eat any other meat.
“I have now received eternal food
Earthly meat will I never touch
Now realize what you have done
Have mercy on me—and believe.”
With that the lady in front of all in sight
Yielded up her spirit with a moan;
The high god of heaven almighty
On us have mercy—every one.
My life closed twice before its close—
EMILY DICKINSON
My life closed twice before its close—
It yet remains to see
If Immortality unveil
A third event to me
So huge, so hopeless to conceive
As these that twice befell.
Parting is all we know of heaven,
And all we need of hell.
When We Two Parted
GEORGE GORDON, LORD BYRON
When we two parted
In silence and tears,
Half broken-hearted
To sever for years,
Pale grew thy cheek and cold,
Colder thy kiss;
Sorrow to this.
The dew of the morning
Sunk chill on my brow—
It felt like the warning
Of what I feel now.
Thy vows are all broken,
And light is thy fame;
I hear thy name spoken,
And share in its shame.
They name thee before me,
A knell to mine ear;
A shudder comes o’er me—
Why wert thou so dear?
&n
bsp; They know not I knew thee,
Who knew thee too well:—
Long, long shall I rue thee,
Too deeply to tell.
In secret we met—
In silence I grieve,
That thy heart could forget,
Thy spirit deceive.
If I should meet thee
After long years,
How should I greet thee?—
With silence and tears.
Well, I Have Lost You
EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY
Well, I have lost you; and I lost you fairly;
In my own way, and with my full consent.
Say what you will, kings in a tumbrel rarely
Went to their deaths more proud than this one went.
Some nights of apprehension and hot weeping
I will confess; but that’s permitted me;
Day dried my eyes; I was not one for keeping
Rubbed in a cage a wing that would be free.
If I had loved you less or played you slyly
I might have held you for a summer more,
But at the cost of words I value highly,
And no such summer as the one before.
Should I outlive this anguish—and men do—
I shall have only good to say of you.
What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why (Sonnet XLIII)
EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY
What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why,
I have forgotten, and what arms have lain
Under my head till morning; but the rain
Is full of ghosts tonight, that tap and sigh
Upon the glass and listen for reply,
And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain
For unremembered lads that not again
Will turn to me at midnight with a cry.
Thus in winter stands the lonely tree,
Nor knows what birds have vanished one by one,
Yet knows its boughs more silent than before:
I cannot say what loves have come and gone,
I only know that summer sang in me
A little while, that in me sings no more.
“No, Thank You, John”
CHRISTINA ROSSETTI
I never said I loved you, John:
Why will you teaze me day by day,
And wax a weariness to think upon
With always “do” and “pray”?
You know I never loved you, John;
No fault of mine made me your toast:
Why will you haunt me with a face as wan
As shows an hour-old ghost?
I dare say Meg or Moll would take
Pity upon you, if you’d ask:
And pray don’t remain single for my sake
Who can’t perform that task.
I have no heart?—Perhaps I have not;
But then you’re mad to take offence
That I don’t give you what I have not got:
Use your own common sense.
Let bygones be bygones:
Don’t call me false, who owed not to be true:
Than answer “Yes” to you.
Let’s mar our pleasant days no more,
Song-birds of passage, days of youth:
Catch at today, forget the days before:
I’ll wink at your untruth.
Let us strike hands as hearty friends;
No more, no less; and friendship’s good:
Only don’t keep in view ulterior ends,
And points not understood
In open treaty. Rise above
Quibbles and shuffling off and on:
Here’s friendship for you if you like; but love,—
No, thank you, John.
when you have forgotten Sunday: the love story
GWENDOLYN BROOKS
——And when you have forgotten the bright bedclothes
on a Wednesday and a Saturday,
And most especially when you have forgotten Sunday—
When you have forgotten Sunday halves in bed;
Or me sitting on the front-room radiator in the limping afternoon
Looking off down the long street
To nowhere,
Hugged by my plain old wrapper of no-expectation
And nothing-I-have-to-do and I’m-happy-why?
And if-Monday-never-had-to-come—
When you have forgotten that, I say,
And how you swore, if somebody beeped the bell,
And how my heart played hopscotch if the telephone rang;
And how we finally went in to Sunday dinner,
That is to say, went across the front room floor to the ink-spotted table in the southwest corner
To Sunday dinner, which was always chicken and noodles
Or chicken and rice
And salad and rye bread and tea
And chocolate chip cookies—
I say, when you have forgotten that,
When you have forgotten my little presentiment
That the war would be over before they got to you;
And how we finally undressed and whipped out the light and flowed into bed,
And lay loose-limbed for a moment in the week-end
Bright bedclothes,
Then gently folded into each other—
When you have, I say, forgotten all that,
Then you may tell,
Then I may believe
You have forgotten me well.
The End
ELIZABETH ALEXANDER
The last thing of you is a doll, velveteen and spangle,
silk douponi trousers, Ali Baba slippers that curl up at the toes,
tinsel moustache, a doll we had made in your image
for our wedding with one of me which you have.
They sat atop our coconut cake. We cut it
into snowy squares and fed each other, while God watched.
All other things are gone now: the letters boxed,
pajama-sized shirts bagged for Goodwill, odd utensils
farmed to graduating students starting first apartments
(citrus zester, apple corer, rusting mandoline),
childhood pictures returned to your mother,
trinkets sorted real from fake and molten
to a single bar of gold, untruths parsed,
most things unsnarled, the rest let go
save the doll, which I find in a closet,
examine closely, then set into a hospitable tree
which I drive past daily for weeks and see it still there,
in the rain, in the wind, fading in the sun,
no one will take it, it will not blow away,
in the rain, in the wind,
it holds tight to its branch,
then one day, it is gone.
MARRIAGE
GETTING MARRIED WAS THE BEST DECISION I have ever made. Not only is my husband the most wonderful person imaginable, but at the time, it was such a relief to have it all over with! Even though I was a first-year law student determined to concentrate on my professional options, getting married took over my life. To be honest, it had always been a major preoccupation for me, my friends and cousins. We spent countless childhood hours planning imaginary weddings. Would we elope? Could we bring our ponies? What would our bridesmaids wear, especially if they were on their ponies. When I hit my twenties and people started getting married for real, weekends were consumed with bridal showers—complete with skits, songs, and the occasional stripper. There were endless fittings for hideous dresses, but also lots of laughs and backstage drama. My wedding was no exception. Fortunately, I had a fantastic time, and life has only gotten better because I have someone to share it with.
Each marriage is as unique as the two people in it, but universal too. Getting married is an act of hope and optimism—an affirmation of life. Every marriage, like every life, goes through its ups and downs, and the institution o
f marriage is challenged by personal and historical inequities. Yet the pursuit of love and the strength of a lifelong commitment remain their own rewards and the foundation of much of our social order.
Most of these poems are romantic, realistic, wise, and funny. It’s hard not to be swept off one’s feet reading Christopher Marlowe’s poem “The Passionate Shepherd to His Love.” The romantic ideal underlying marriage is embodied by the excerpt from The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia by Sir Philip Sidney. Its most famous line, “My true love hath my heart and I have his,” is echoed by e. e. cummings four hundred years later when he writes, “i carry your heart with me(i carry it in/my heart).”
I have tried to include poems that examine different aspects of the marital relationship. Comparing a passage from the Book of Proverbs about the virtuous wife to Lady Mary Chudleigh’s warning in “To the Ladies” gives us a historical perspective on the relative status of husbands and wives. Not surprisingly, women come up short. There are also grim, loveless depictions like Robert Lowell’s “To Speak of Woe That Is in Marriage.” Even more chilling is Robert Browning’s classic “My Last Duchess,” in which the fact that the husband has murdered his wife is gradually revealed.
At least Ogden Nash and Rudyard Kipling bring a little levity to the subject. In “A Word to Husbands” and “The Female of the Species,” they complain loudly that women dominate the home and everyone who enters it. An excerpt from John Milton’s Paradise Lost takes us back to the beginning of the “vain contest” between husband and wife, which he describes as a struggle that shall have no end.
Fortunately, however, most poems about marriage celebrate companionship, passion, and the oneness of two people in a long-term partnership. “Letter from My Wife” is one of many poems written from prison by Nazim Hikmet, a Turkish poet jailed for his political activities. Filled with longing and the desire to be reunited before death, these poems make the reader’s heart ache. Poet Laureate W. S. Merwin’s poem “To Paula in Late Spring” reflects on the memories of a lifetime of love.