After Eden

By Rachel Wetzsteon 1967–2009 Rachel Wetzsteon

Somewhere Zeno was smiling, the foul

goblins of paradox were wearing

their fairest clothes that night. My Dinner

with a Chainsaw, the evening could have

been called; and when one too many led

to wise judgements too few, “I’m trying

to break up with you!” he shouted as

stockings and scruples flew; and what was

over wasn’t; the brutal doings

were sweeter than a caress; the thrill

of it happening and the horror

of it being an awful mistake

collided like sweaty bodies in

the dark, disheveled room. So this is

moving on, she reflected after

he left. But what was motion? No straight

bright line but a wind every bit as

stormy as the people it carried

away from safety, through towns that froze

and burned, helping them forward but not

letting them forget for a second

their ceaseless looking for what is lost,

their sad resemblance to the quick and

stubborn arrows that never arrive.

Source: Sakura Park (Persea Books, 2006)

Biography

Born in Manhattan, poet and editor Rachel Wetzsteon received degrees from Yale University, Johns Hopkins University, and Columbia University. She made her home in the Morningside Heights neighborhood of Manhattan, which is the setting for many of her formally assured poems. Influenced by Charles Baudelaire, Soren Kierkegaard, and Philip Larkin, Wetzsteon infused her urban and emotional landscapes with a dry wit. As critic Adam . . .

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