Alba, and: Liebesgedicht

ALBA / Ellen Bryant Voigt My daughter calls me into light to see the world has altered while she slept. Like my mother's voice that pulled me from the clarifying dark, her voice will not relent, a bell at my ear rehearsing gladly for her own child in whom my long thirst for sleep will reappear. Hush. Hush. My work there is not finished. Before morning overwhelms the house, I must ford the tall grasses— Then the circle of birches, the stranger's face not yet in full shadow. 14 ¦ The Missouri Review LIEBESGEDICHT / Ellen Bryant Voigt I love you as my other self, as the other self of the tree is not the pale tree in the flat hand of the river, but the earth that holds, is held by, the root of the tree. This is how the earth loves the river, and why its least fold solicits each impulsive stream until the gathered water makes of earth a passage to the sea. I'd like to draw a lesson from this figure, and find some comfort in the way the larger world rings with such dependencies. But if I see ourselves in earth and water, I also see one taken from the other, the rivening wind loosed against the tree. The Missouri Review · 15 ...