Te Deum

By Eleanor Ross Taylor
Lord
         sho been good to me
 
                 My loved hoe handle, and my sweat,
heart pounding and the towhee singing.
 
         Jill, jerking the hospital sheets,
               “Damn careless nurses    ...    
“But golly    ...    a good life.
       “That student who kept writing me.
                “That rainy picnic by a road in Burgundy.
“Heart thumping, thumping on    ...    more, more....”
 
                 A squirrel on a post.
The nutgrooved skull
         drops; he claws the dirt.
                 Next winter!
Frost thrown down,
         a stiffened morning,
                 a harsh corrective herb
to gnaw, take in.
 
         Sho been, Lord, Sho been
 
                 Whether born of  kiss sublime,
victim’s terror, rapist crime, and
         however ending,
                 nut-gnawers nulled
inscrutably, or
         Caesars,
                 soldiers, friends
lammed open-eyed —
 
         Lord, good...sho been
Notes:

This poem is part of a special section of Poetry magazine's May issue


 

Copyright Credit: Eleanor Ross Taylor, "Te Deum" from Captive Voices. Copyright © 2009 by Eleanor Ross Taylor. Reprinted by permission of Louisiana State University Press.
Source: Poetry (May 2010)