For As Many Hours Poem by Robert Rorabeck

For As Many Hours



I carry pictures of that miraculous cloak,
But I will never make it that far to Canterbury,
Or wherever;
And it is almost as if now that I have gone down beneath the sea:
I can see you changing her, Alma:
I can feel you body almost disappearing the way it does at night
Laying beside your man:
You were pregnant with Michael when you were sixteen,
While I was kicking out the lights of my own dream:
There are many lights refracted deep in the beds of her sea,
And you can pray to your virgin and sea them all while you lay
Beside your man;
And nothing that I have had to say about you has been enough to
Describe a single one of your fingerprints,
Or the way you breath around me the three days a week we have together,
The nine hours a day:
I think it must be more time than you spend consciously with your husband,
But he will make you harvest the rabbits that you love anyways:
Bring them over to my house and save them, and we can start a new family;
And the sea will love us especially,
And we can still work together nine hours a day,
And sleep for as many hours together for so many nights.

COMMENTS OF THE POEM
Kerry O'Connor 07 May 2010

'Bring them over to my house and save them...' fantastic line! I especially love all the following lines to the end of the poem. How could she resist such a passionate suggestion?

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Robert Rorabeck

Robert Rorabeck

Berrien Springs
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