亚色影库app

An open access publication of the 亚色影库app & Sciences
Summer 2006

Incarnation: 9:30 am to 9:36 am

Author
Jorie Graham
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Jorie Graham, a Fellow of the American Academy since 1999, is Boylston Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory at Harvard University. She has published numerous collections of poetry, including 鈥淗ybrids of Plants and of Ghosts鈥 (1980), 鈥淭he End of Beauty鈥 (1987), 鈥淭he Dream of the Unified Field: Selected Poems 1974鈥1994鈥 (1995), which won the 1996 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, 鈥淣ever鈥 (2002), and, most recently, 鈥淥verlord鈥 (2005). She has also edited two anthologies, 鈥淓arth Took of Earth: 100 Great Poems of the English Language鈥 (1996) and 鈥淭he Best American Poetry 1990.鈥 Graham served as a Chancellor of The Academy of American Poets from 1997 to 2003.

Incarnation: 9:30 am to 9:36 am


     She sits on the straightback chair in the room.
A ray of sun is calling across the slatwood floor.
     I say she because my body is so still
in the folds of daylight
     through which the one beam slants.
I say calling because it lays itself down
     with a twang and a licking monosyllable

across the pine floor-boards鈥
     making a meaning like a wide sharp thought鈥
an unrobed thing we can see the inside of鈥
     less place than time鈥

less time than the shedding skin of time, the thought
                    of time,

the yellow swath it cuts
     on the continuum鈥
now to the continuum
     what she is to me,
a ceremonial form, an intransigent puissant corridor
                    nothing will intersect,

and yet nothing really
     鈥揹ust, a little heat . . .
She waits.
     Her leg extended, she waits for it鈥
foot, instep, calf鈥
     the I, the beam
of sun鈥
     the now and now

it moving like a destiny across,
     neither lured-on nor pushed-forward,
without architecture,
     without
beginning,
     over the book lying in the dust,

over the cracked plank鈥揹own into the crack鈥揳cross鈥

not animal
     nothing that can be deduced-from or built-upon,
aswarm with dust and yet
     not entered by the dust,

not touched
     smearing everything with a small warm gaiety鈥

over the pillow-seam over the water glass鈥

cracking and bending but not cracking or bending鈥

over the instep now, holding the foot鈥

     her waiting to feel the warmth then beginning
to feel it鈥
     the motion of it and the warmth of it not identical鈥
the one-way-motion of it, the slow sweep,
     approaching her as a fate approaches, inhuman but
                    resembling
feeling,

without deviation,
     turning each instant a notch deeper towards
the only forwards,
     but without beginning,
and never鈥搉ot ever鈥
     not moving
forwards . . .

Meanwhile the knowledge of things lies round,
     over which the beam鈥
Meanwhile the transparent air
     through or into which the beam鈥
over the virtual and the material鈥
     over the world and over the world of the beholder鈥
glides:

     it does not change, crawler, but things are
肠丑补苍驳别诲鈥
     the mantle, the cotton-denim bunched at
                    the knees鈥

diamonds appearing on the tips of things then disappearing鈥
     each edge voluble with the plushnesses of silence鈥

     now up to her folded arms鈥搘arm under the elbow鈥
almost a sad smell in the honeyed yellow鈥
     (the ridge of the collarbone) (the tuck of the neck)
till suddenly (as if by
     accident)

     she is inside鈥(ear, cheek)鈥搕he slice of time

now on the chin, now on
     the lips, making her rise up into me,
forcing me to close my eyes,
     the whole of the rest feeling broken off,

it all being my face, my being inside the beam of sun,

     and the sensation of how it falls unevenly,

     how the wholeness I felt in the shadow is lifted,
broken, this tip lit, this other dark鈥揳nd stratified,
     analysed, chosen-round, formed鈥