The Journey

By James Wright 1927–1980 James Wright

Anghiari is medieval, a sleeve sloping down

A steep hill, suddenly sweeping out

To the edge of a cliff, and dwindling.

But far up the mountain, behind the town,

We too were swept out, out by the wind,

Alone with the Tuscan grass.

Wind had been blowing across the hills

For days, and everything now was graying gold

With dust, everything we saw, even

Some small children scampering along a road,

Twittering Italian to a small caged bird.

We sat beside them to rest in some brushwood,

And I leaned down to rinse the dust from my face.

I found the spider web there, whose hinges

Reeled heavily and crazily with the dust,

Whole mounds and cemeteries of it, sagging

And scattering shadows among shells and wings.

And then she stepped into the center of air

Slender and fastidious, the golden hair

Of daylight along her shoulders, she poised there,

While ruins crumbled on every side of her.

Free of the dust, as though a moment before

She had stepped inside the earth, to bathe herself.

I gazed, close to her, till at last she stepped

Away in her own good time.

Many men

Have searched all over Tuscany and never found

What I found there, the heart of the light

Itself shelled and leaved, balancing

On filaments themselves falling. The secret

Of this journey is to let the wind

Blow its dust all over your body,

To let it go on blowing, to step lightly, lightly

All the way through your ruins, and not to lose

Any sleep over the dead, who surely

Will bury their own, don’t worry.

James Wright, “The Journey” from Above the River: The Complete Poems and Selected Prose. Copyright © 1990 by Anne Wright. Used by permission of Farrar, Straus & Giroux, LLC, www.fsgbooks.com. All rights reserved. Caution: Users are warned that this work is protected under copyright laws and downloading is strictly prohibited. The right to reproduce or transfer the work via any medium must be secured with Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC.

Source: Above the River: The Complete Poems and Selected Prose (Farrar Straus and Giroux, 1990)

Biography

James Wright was frequently referred to as one of America's finest contemporary poets. He was admired by critics and fellow poets alike for his willingness and ability to experiment with language and style, as well as for his thematic concerns. In the Minnesota Review, Peter A. Stitt wrote that Wright's work both represents and parallels the development of the best modern American poets: "Reading the Collected Poems of James . . .

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