“Museum Piece” by Hayden Carruth
One of the things I love most about reading literary non-fiction is that the works become cryptic maps to other great works. Thanks to Wendell Berry (WHAT ARE People FOR?, (1990)) for the introduction. I’ve only just started exploring his works, but this one touched me deeply this morning. Good poetry does that…touches you where you don’t know you are raw. Museum Piece The eye that made this saw no pallor,But golden and blue paint;Now on the dry wood the colorIs tenuous and faint. Yet under the scratches our close studyRetrieves for our curious eyesGod raising the small from the larger body,And there the new Eve lies. Would we smile fondly in our pride?Ours is a long descent,Worked in the flesh of a tiny brideScarce fit for ravishment, And she, discovering she was woman,Measured her strength of will,By which we estimate the humanAnd sorrow and courage still. But listen. Beneath the […]