Poem of the Week
2 Laureates / 2 Poems
September 27, 2004
by Ted Kooser
U.S. Poet Laureate
as red as to lose
and as round as to find
--e. e. cummings
Trout leap from the Poudre River,
brief rosy flash, then the splash ripples
while I listen to you
as you twist the new ring you bought
because you couldn't stop touching
the empty place,
and you take it off and hand it to me.
New green lines the banks;
green bugs the trout desire
hover just out of reach.
I'm trying to leap
into what I need, letting my body
arch over the current
we're moving in, then drop,
staying with the must be,
with the big red oh
of the open mouth:
the muscular zero of it.
--Mary Crow
Reprinted from I Have Tasted the Apple.
Poems by Mary Crow.
BOA Editions, Ltd., Brockport, NY, 1996.
Copyright (c) 1996 by Mary Crow.
Used with the author's permission.
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