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Classic and Contemporary Poetry


CONVALESCENCE by HUMBERT WOLFE

First Line: WHEN YOU SIT PROPPED IN BED / YOU SEEM TO ME
Last Line: SAP, I THINK.
Subject(s): SICKNESS; ILLNESS;

I

WHEN you sit propped in bed
you seem to me
something a poet said
impulsively.

And when you gaze in grave unwinking
silence, it is as though
they were not thoughts that you were thinking,
but flakes of snow.

And when you speak the moment after
not words, but shadows flit
softly, as though the sun were laughter,
and light were made of it.

II

WHEN Ann sat up
the sap began --
spring's guttersnipe --
to rap -- and ran;

and though the trees were
black as ink,
they understood the
sap, I think.



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