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1 " The stratagems by which briefly youameliorated, even seeminglyuntwisted what still twists within you —you loved their taste and lay thereon your sidenursing like a puppy. "
― Frank Bidart , Watching the Spring Festival
2 " The law is that youmust livein the house you have built.The law is absurd: it iswritten down nowhere.You are uncertain what crimeis, though each life writhing toelude what it has madefeels like punishment. "
3 " The Old Man at the WheelMeasured against the immeasurable universe, no word you have spokenbrought light. Broughtlight to what, as a child, you thoughttoo dark to be survived. By exorcismyou survived. By submission, then making.You let all the parts of that thing you wouldcut out of you enter your poem becauseenacting there all its parts allowed youthe illusion you could cut it from your soul.Dilemmas of choice given what cannotchange alone roused you to words.As you grip the things that were young when you were young, they crumble in your hand.Now you must drive west, which in Novembermeans driving directly into the sun. "
4 " Though the body is itsgenesis, a poem is the vision of a processOut of ceaseless motion in edgeless spaceCarved in space, vision your poor eye's singlearmor against winter spring summer fall "