Because I could not stop for Death
-by Emily Dickinson
Because I could not stop for Death,
He kindly stopped for me;
The carriage held but just ourselves
And Immortality.
We slowly drove, he knew no haste,
And I had put away
My labor, and my leisure too,
For his civility.
We passed the school, where children strove
At recess, in the ring;
We passed the fields of gazing grain,
We passed the setting sun.
Or rather, he passed us;
The dews grew quivering and chill,
For only gossamer my gown,
My tippet only tulle.
We paused before a house that seemed
A swelling of the ground;
The roof was scarcely visible,
The cornice but a mound.
Since then ‘tis centuries, and yet each
Feels shorter than the day
I first surmised the horses’ heads
Were toward eternity.
Cherry Blossoms Blowing In Wet, Blowing Snow
- by James Galvin
In all the farewells in all the airports in all the profane dawns.
In the Fiat with no documents on the road to Madrid. At the
Corrida. In the Lope de Vega, the Annalena, the Jerome. In time
past, time lost, time yet to pass. In poetry. In watery deserts, on
arid seas, between desserts and seas. In sickness and in health. In
pain and in the celebration of pain. In the delivery room. In the
garden. In the hammock under the aspen. In all the emergencies. In
the waterfall. In toleration. In retaliation. In rhyme. Among cherry
blossoms blowing in wet, blowing snow, weren’t we something?