“My job as a human being as well as a writer is to feel as thoroughly as possible the experience that I am part of, and then press it a little further.” – Jane Hirshfield
Born in New York City in 1953, Hirshfield is an essayist and poet. Her individual poems and books of poems have been recognized with numerous national and international awards. For Saturday’s Poem, here is Hirshfield’s,
The Heat of Autumn
The heat of autumn
is different from the heat of summer.
One ripens apples, the other turns them to cider.
One is a dock you walk out on,
the other the spine of a thin swimming horse
and the river each day a full measure colder.
A man with cancer leaves his wife for his lover.
Before he goes she straightens his belts in the closet,
rearranges the socks and sweaters inside the dresser
by color.
That's autumn heat:
her hand placing silver buckles with silver,
gold buckles with gold, setting each
on the hook it belongs on in a closet soon to be empty,
and calling it pleasure.
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