To climb these stairs again, bearing a tray,
Might be to find you pillowed with your books,
Your inventories listing gowns and frocks
As if preparing for a holiday.
Or, turning from the landing, I might find
My presence watched through your kaleidoscope,
A symmetry of husbands, each redesigned
In lovely forms of foresight, prayer and hope.
I climb these stairs a dozen times a day
And, by the open door, wait, looking in
At where you died. My hands become a tray
Offering me, my flesh, my soul, my skin.
Grief wrongs us so. I stand, and wait, and cry
For the absurd forgiveness, not knowing why.
Wrong to use a computerised voice to recite poems. All subtelty intonation of a human voice lost
I just love how Dunn, like in this sonnet, offers the reader a journey into love. The opening two quatrains are masterful in setting up the turn/caesura, as the quotidian routines of couples/love are overturned by the misfortunes of a premature death. The final two triplets turn upside the expectations set up the opening half through the images of a tray and a symmetry of husbands.
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
Yo this sounds like a dope intro tape
And it totally was a dope intro track. I've never heard a poem more suited for a track by the body.