Kay Ryan Poems

Nothing exists as a block
and cannot be parceled up.
So if nothing's ventured
it's not just talk;
...

To the dragon
any loss is total.
...

It is at the edges
that time
thins.
...

As though
the river were
...

Patience is wider
than one once envisioned,
...

The chickens are circling
and blotting out the day.
...

Say when rain
cannot make
you more wet
...

Everything contains some silence.
Noise gets its zest from the small
...

"If we have not struggled
as hard as we can
at our strongest
how will we sense
...

We are always
really carrying
a ladder, but it's
invisible. We
only know
something's
the matter:
something precious
crashes; easy doors
prove impassable.
Or, in the body,
there's too much
swing or off-
center gravity.
And, in the mind,
a drunken capacity,
access to out-of-range
apples. As though
one had a way to climb
out of the damage
and apology.
...