Stephen Dunn
Walking The Marshland
It was no place for the faithless, So I felt a little odd Walking the marshland with my daughters, Canada geese all around and the blue Herons just standing there; Safe, and the abundance
Welcome
if you believe nothing is always what’s left After a while, as I did, If you believe you have this collection Of ungiven gifts, as I do (right here Behind the silence and the
Named
He’d spent his life trying to control the names people gave him; Oh the unfair and the accurate equally hurt. Just recently he’d been a son-of-a-bitch and sweetheart in the same day, And once
Slant
Yesterday, for a long while, The early morning sunlight In the trees was sufficient, Replaced by a hello From a long-limbed woman Pedaling her bike, Whereupon the wind came up, Dispersing the mosquitoes. Blessings,
I Come Home Wanting To Touch Everyone
The dogs greet me, I descend Into their world of fur and tongues And then my wife and I embrace As if we’d just closed the door In a motel, our two girls slip
At The Smithville Methodist Church
It was supposed to be Arts & Crafts for a week, But when she came home With the “Jesus Saves” button, we knew what art Was up, what ancient craft. She liked her little
The Sudden Light And The Trees
My neighbor was a biker, a pusher, a dog And wife beater. In bad dreams I killed him And once, in the consequential light of day, I called the Humane Society About Blue, his
Poem For People That Are Understandably Too Busy To Read Poetry
Relax. This won’t last long. Or if it does, or if the lines Make you sleepy or bored, Give in to sleep, turn on The T. V., deal the cards. This poem is built
Story
A woman’s taking her late-afternoon walk On Chestnut where no sidewalk exists And houses with gravel driveways Sit back among the pines. Only the house With the vicious dog is close to the road.
The Routine Things Around The House
When Mother died I thought: now I’ll have a death poem. That was unforgivable. Yet I’ve since forgiven myself As sons are able to do Who’ve been loved by their mothers. I stared into
Essay On The Personal
Because finally the personal Is all that matters, We spend years describing stones, Chairs, abandoned farmhouses- Until we’re ready. Always It’s a matter of precision, What it feels like To kiss someone or to
With No Experience In Such Matters
To hold a damaged sparrow Under water until you feel it die Is to know a small something About the mind; how, for example, It blames the cat for the original crime, How it
Allegory Of The Cave
He climbed toward the blinding light And when his eyes adjusted He looked down and could see His fellow prisoners captivated By shadows; everything he had believed Was false. And he was suddenly In
Landscape At The End Of The Century
The sky in the trees, the trees mixed up With what’s left of heaven, nearby a patch Of daffodils rooted down Where dirt and stones comprise a kind Of night, unmetaphysical, cool as a
Biography In The First Person
This is not the way I am. Really, I am much taller in person, The hairline I conceal reaches back To my grandfather, and the shyness my wife Will not believe in has always