The weight of a man on a woman
is like falling into the river without drowning.
Above, the world is burning and fighting.
Lost worlds flow through others.
But down here beneath water’s skin,
river floor, sand, everything
is floating, rocking.
Water falls through our hands as we fall through it.
And when a woman and a man come up from water
they stand at the elemental edge of difference.
Mirrored on water’s skin,
they are fired clay, water evaporating into air.
They are where water turns away from land
and goes back to enter a larger sea.
A man and a woman are like those rivers,
entering a larger sea
greater than the sum of all its parts.
Linda Hogan, “Two” from The Book of Medicines. Copyright © 1993 by Linda Hogan. Reprinted by permission of Coffee House Press. www.coffeehousepress.org
Source:
The Book of Medicines (Coffee House Press, 1993)
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Poet
Linda Hogan
b. 1947
POET’S REGION
U.S., Southwestern
Subjects
Living,
The Body,
Love,
Desire,
Nature,
Seas, Rivers, & Streams
Poetic Terms
Free Verse,
Metaphor
A Chickasaw novelist, essayist, and environmentalist, Linda Hogan was born in Denver, Colorado. She earned an undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado-Colorado Springs and an MA in English and creative writing from the University of Colorado-Boulder.
Hogan is the author of the poetry collections Calling Myself Home (1978); Daughters, I Love You (1981); Eclipse (1983); Seeing Through the Sun (1985), which won the . . .
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Poem Categorization
SUBJECT
Living,
The Body,
Love,
Desire,
Nature,
Seas, Rivers, & Streams
POET’S REGION
U.S., Southwestern
Poetic Terms
Free Verse,
Metaphor
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Poetry Lectures: Three Native American Poets
