After the Flood

here one island
of joy
where there were two

here three daughters sailing
a four masted ark
through an ocean of tears

i will tell you the truth
this is neither beautiful
nor just

still a God arrives
in a gyre of bees
promising honey

still we drop
to our knees as if

we were dry bone whispering

amen

it is what we do
it is what we are

Lucille Clifton, Poet Laureate of the State of Maryland (1975-85), was recently awarded the National Book Award for her Blessing the Boats (2000). For her numerous books of poetry she has received many fellowships and awards, including the Shelley Memorial Prize, a Charity Randall Citation, an Emmy Award from the American Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, a selection as a Literary Lion by the New York Public Library, a Lannan Achievement Award in Poetry, and the 1999 Lila Wallace-Readers' Digest Writers' Award. She serves on the board of Chancellors of the Academy of American Poets and was recently elected as a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Her poetry collection, The Terrible Stories (1996), was a finalist for the National Book Award, the Lenore Marshall Prize and the Los Angeles Times Book Award.

...