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Sunday, January 8, 2012

"The Snowshoe Hare," by Mary Oliver


The fox
is so quiet—
he moves like a red rain—
even when his
shoulders tense and then
snuggle down for an instant
against the ground
and the perfect
gate of his teeth
slams shut
there is nothing
you can hear
but the cold creek moving
over the dark pebbles
and across the field
and into the rest of the world—
and even when you find
in the morning
the feathery
scuffs of fur
of the vanished
snowshoe hare
tangled
on the pale spires
of the broken flowers
of the lost summer—
fluttering a little
but only
like the lapping threads
of the wind itself—
there is still
nothing that you can hear
but the cold creek moving
over the old pebbles
and across the field and into
another year.
"The Snowshoe Hare" by Mary Oliver, from New & Selected Poems. © Beacon Press, 1992. 

3 comments:

  1. Whoa. Friends have suggested I read her work. "moves like red rain,"broken flowers of hte lost summer....."This one is replete with gems. Thanks for this one!

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  2. Herringbone: My pleasure. I have loved her poetry for awhile; this one was new to me, and has become one of my favorites. I love it. Heck, I think I love her.

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