This one is an old favourite from my high school days. Some people would automaticall discredit this poem, because (gasp!) it appears in the Norton Anthology. Actually, I understand people’s frustrations with Norton, but I don’t think that everything they include is crap. Especially not this:
Song
My heart, my dove, my snail, my sail, my
milktooth, shadow, sparrow, fingernail,
flower-cat and blossom-hedge, mandrakeroot now put to bed, moonshell, sea-swell,
manatee, emerald shining back at me,
nutmeg, quince, tea leaf and bone, zither,cymbal, xylophone: paper, scissors, then
there’s stone—Who doesn’t come through the door
to get home?– Cynthia Zarin
Ms. Zarin also has a wonderful nonfiction essay, called “An Enlarged Heart,” that everyone reading this blog ought to dig up. It’s heartbreaking, tense, warm, loving, urgent, and very, very Zarin.
Natalia A. 