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Post by louisa on Oct 13, 2008 5:00:17 GMT 2
Phyllis WebbProposition
I could divide a leaf and give you half.
Or I could search for two leaves sending you one.
Or I could walk to the river and look across
and seeing you there, or not there,
absence or presence, would spring the balance to my day.
Or I could directly find you and take your hand so that one hand would be given
and one kept, like a split leaf or like two leaves separate.
These would be signs and offerings: the just passion, just encountering.
Or we perhaps could speed four eyes, the chariot horses of our dreams and visions,
in them direction and decision find. The split leaf floating on the river,
the hand sketching in the air a half-moon, its hidden wholeness there. from The Vision Tree, Selected Poems, Talonbooks, 1982, which won the Governer General's Award for Poetry.The text of Proposition and an analysis of the poem by Yvonne Blomer can be found on the Arc Poetry: How Poems Work websitewww.arcpoetry.ca/howpoemswork/features/2004_04_blomer.php
Other sites of interest - -
www.parl.gc.ca/information/about/people/poet/poem-of-the-week/poems-e.htm?param=14
www.uwo.ca/english/canadianpoetry/cpjrn/vol32/potvin.htm
www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/literaryarchives/027011-200.142-e.html
www.bcbookworld.com/terasen/phyllisweb.html
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