A Rune, Interminable

Low above the moss

a sprig of scarlet berries

soon eaten or blackened

tells time.

            Go to a wedding

            as to a funeral:

            bury the loss.

            Go to a funeral

            as to a wedding:

            marry the loss.

            Go to a coming

            as to a going:

            unhurrying.

            Time is winter-green.

            Seeds keep time.

            Time, so kept, carries us

            across to no-time where

            no time is lost.

                          - Marie Ponsot

During the month of April, Knopf emails out a poem each day, each by a different featured author.  This has been an exciting way for me to sample new poets and to sneak a glance into the new works of old favorites. 

This particular poem is a sample from the most recent collection, Easy, by venerable poet-professor Marie Ponsot who is now in her 80's.  Knopf's author page offers background on her life and work, plus samples from Easy, while Poets.org (my favorite site to troll for new American poets) offers additional biographical and critical information about her, plus more of her poems and links to external resources too.

I'm happy to have rediscovered her work today, and trust that you will be too.

MFB,
L

BONUS:  Here's another of Ponsot's poems, this one offered for Easter last year by Knopf:

Transport

The rose, for all its behavior,

is smaller than the lifelove it stands for,

only briefly brightening,

and even its odor

only a metaphor.

Or so we suppose

just as we suppose the savior

we employ or see next door

is only some hired man

gardening.