"The Hole"
Click
And in my exhaustion, my stupefied numb thought
Dug and dug its way down to where I knew
You were—though how could I believe it?
Once, your irony and honesty refused
To let you say, "Oh yes, my son the genius!"
When I showed you a poem—saying with Groucho deadpan,
As you handed me back the paper, the typed words
Already a little smudged: "Hopkins is a good poet."
And then you recited, "Margaret are you grieving
Over goldengrove unleaving? ... " winking
At the poets not yet born ... poets who would
Come after me, poets who would not believe
There was any such woman as you,
Who would say of them and their poetry,
Shrugging a little, smiling your sly, lopsided grin:
"How old are you, hon? From what I've read,
Your sex life must be very important to you."
Digging in the snow, digging with its nails
Down deep in the snow, the wind kept trying
To hollow a hole deep enough to escape its own bitter
Blowing of snow around the frozen garden.
Tom Sleigh's most recent books are Space Walk, a volume of poetry, and Interview With a Ghost, a collection of essays.
For Slate's poetry submission guidelines, click spacerhereyeshyperlinkPoetry SubmissionsSlate reads new poems from Oct. 1 to April 30. Manuscripts sent between May 1 and Sept. 30 will not be considered.To submit poems: Send, as a single attached document, up to three poems of no more than 50 lines each to editors@slatepoems.com. Use the poet's name for the subject line of the e-mail and for the title of the attachment. We prefer Word documents (.doc or .docx) to PDFs.Please include a brief, professional cover letter, including publication history, in the body of your email. Please limit submissions to one per poet per annual reading period. Simultaneous submissions are OK. Slate no longer accepts poetry submissions by mail. The email address editors@slatepoems.com is for poetry submissions only (or to notify editors of acceptance elsewhere of a poem under consideration at Slate). Other inquiries, etc., will not be addressed.10000false220061444537PMWednesdayJanJanuary161/4/2006 9:45:37 PM63271989937000000020061444537PMWednesdayJanJanuary161/4/2006 9:45:37 PM632719899370000000.Clickhere to visit Robert Pinsky's Favorite Poem Project site.