Fragment 22

Sappho, Fragment 22, from
If Not, Winter (Anne Carson)

“The spirit moves, but not always upward…”
[Theodore Roethke, “Meditations of an Old Woman”]

a.

waking this morning, an arm would not work

sleep & weight had robbed it of its force

it only took minutes to return at the elbow, then the wrist

a look in the mirror showed:

sleep left heavy lines across my face

if not today, what is winter?

temperature falling through the afternoon,

wind nearly silent through thick glass,

no pain afflicts the body

but much is seen, in its waves

because I prayed for clarity

this word: patience

I want to feel you near me

b.

there is only so much one can stand: work

satisfies until it doesn’t.

which face will show this morning:

the one that is impatient? enthusiastic?

exasperated? content? if not winter, when

will the prizes arrive? certainly not spring.

No pain without desire.

Is this because I prayed for accolades?

I should have never heard this word: ποιϝέω.

I want to be silent.

c.

being here with you is never work

(always home)

I never fail to see us both in each face

(the three boys who won’t stay still)

we will stay close, if not, winter,

no pain can preserve us from time

because I prayed that they would grow,

this word: patience &

I want, I want, I want

them to slow down

d.

work stacks & family holds

this face knows all four seasons

(if the spirit moves)

what is premature spring if not winter?

there is no pain if no loss,

all is temporary anyway:

(if the spirit moves)

because I prayed for happiness

this word: expectation

I want & must endure the spin

of gain & loss & loss & gain

(if the spirit moves)

Night

having come from heaven wrapped in a purple cloak


[Sappho, Fragment 54, Anne Carson, trans.]

everything conforms to her because she calls
so calm:   let the darkness settle around you,
a perfect fit for a mind in need of restful sleep

Humility

I would not think to touch the sky with two arms


[Sappho, Fragment 52, Anne Carson, trans.]

grabbing something of it to gather in for wish-making,
knowing enough of prayer to doubt the silence or the answer,
settle instead for the habitual, bedside beads, a piety of memory:

if I were the one to call down miracles would there be such emptiness?

This One

of all stars the most beautiful

[Sappho, Fragment 104b, Anne Carson, trans.]

this one, just now shining,
speaks to me of possibility,
saying:

it is no use to wish,
all that is yours will
in its due time come.

Need

not one girl I think
           who looks on the light of the sun
                       will ever
                       have wisdom
                       like this

[Sappho, Fragment 56, Anne Carson, trans.]


to know 
             that need is without, is loud,
&           
             contentment is within, is silent
            

April Poem # 6

Conceit

In a moment of brilliance,
I compared the gods of
Lombardo's Homer's Iliad
to television addicts
eager to interact
with the dying actors
on that reality stage,
only to find that I was
fifteen years behind
the curve of genius of
Anne Carson's well-strung bow.

Today, a friend asked me
about contemporary painters
to illustrate his theory
of music for the academy's sake.

This is not a fugue,
but time always
seems to contradict
my best ideas.

This is what I was talking about...

(...in the previous poem.)


Meghan O'Rourke on Anne Carson's Nox:

Carson has always been interested in pockets of experience that can’t be approached directly but must be courted obliquely. This style is peculiarly suited to capturing grief, which is irrational, physiological, mutable—and, often, mute. As Iris Murdoch once wrote, “The bereaved cannot communicate with the unbereaved.” Because the dead person is absent and voiceless (the word nox both rhymes with the Latin word vox, or voice, and contains the English word “no”), the bereaved is always experiencing the lost through other things: books, ideas, language, memory. A sense of this is what Carson’s memory book provides; its process of assemblage dramatizes the way the mind in mourning flits from pain at the specific loss to metaphysical questioning about what, exactly, constitutes a mortal life.

Read more:  THE UNFOLDING by Meghan O’Rourke


Interestingly, Carson's book was not the impetus for the poem however; McCann's was. I do have Carson's book and have been enthralled by it, but I put it down a month and a half ago and haven't come back to it yet. I guess my mind was/is still processing it. I will open it back up tonight.