Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE QUARREL by KAREN SWENSON

First Line: YOU SIT BEHIND YOUR COFFEE
Last Line: LURCHES A PATH ACROSS THE TABLE.
Subject(s): QUARRELS; ARGUMENTS; DISAGREEMENTS;
You sit behind your coffee.
I sit behind mine.
Our eyes are inside us.

Silence lies stale between us
on this morning whose heat is rent
by the singular shrill of a cicada.

Our quarrel is stale as a warped slice of bread.
Oppressive as this August morning is our love,
which, mute as a moth with a torn wing,
lurches a path across the table.



Home: PoetryExplorer.net