20 Jan
2016
Posted in: Poems
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Happiness and Unhappiness

I’m feeling the need for a little Jane Hirshfield today.

looking-backLate Self-Portrait by Rembrandt
by Jane Hirshfield

The dog, dead for years, keeps coming back in
the dream.

We look at each other there with the old joy.

It was always her gift to bring me into the
present–

Which sleeps, changes, awakens, dresses,
leaves.

 

Happiness and unhappiness
differ as a bucket hammered from gold differs
from one of pressed tin,
this painting proposes.

Each carries the same water, it says.

 

 

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