Lisa Russ Spaar

Trouble

And so it took shape, & from what.
True, a voice wept for you
while singing, from the year behind you.
From your crib.

Almost, you became used to it,
& the laws of blood transmitting
from thin skins of strong, troubled wrists.
Morning like a scab.

Wind wrests a fallen paper by the nape,
twists as if it held your name inside.
The eternal is not interrupted by this
even as you cup it in your fists.

Author: Lisa Russ Spaar

Lisa Russ Spaar is the author/editor of over ten poetry collections and anthologies. Her awards include a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Rona Jaffe Award, and the Library of Virginia Poetry Prize. Her essays have appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, Chronicle of Higher Education, Los Angeles Review of Books, and elsewhere. She is a professor at the University of Virginia.

Plume: Issue #8 February 2012