Wind In Mytilene

Wind In Mytilene

By Eloise Klein Healy b. 1943 Eloise Klein Healy
and on the waves in turmoil
in the harbor
gulls floated
like pieces of paper
set adrift, little
boat-like birds
twirling
in the wind-tossed waves
that drove into
the strong arms of the seawall
at the apex of the bay
where a statue of Sappho stands,
young woman
with a lyre—not
looking out to sea
but glancing at the curve
of the seawall
and the birds,
those lost notes
before rain

Eloise Klein Healy, “Wind In Mytilene” from The Islands Project. Copyright © 2007 by Eloise Klein Healy. Reprinted by permission of Red Hen Press.

Source: The Islands Project (Red Hen Press, 2007)

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Poet Eloise Klein Healy b. 1943

POET’S REGION U.S., Western

Subjects Nature, Seas, Rivers, & Streams, Animals, Arts & Sciences, Poetry & Poets

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Biography

Born in El Paso, Texas, Eloise Klein Healy grew up in rural Iowa. Healy's crisp, image- and narrative-driven poems often explore community, sexuality, and the nature of home. On the radio program Writers on Writing, Healy discussed her work’s attention to “the influence of place on people.” Addressing the role of the open-air California landscape and the details of daily life that often ground her poems, Healy noted, “The way . . .

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Poems by Eloise Klein Healy

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SUBJECT Nature, Seas, Rivers, & Streams, Animals, Arts & Sciences, Poetry & Poets

POET’S REGION U.S., Western

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Originally appeared in Poetry magazine.

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