I sat in the sun BY JANE HIRSHFIELD I moved my chair into sun I sat in the sun the way hunger is moved when called fasting.

A Chair in Snow BY JANE HIRSHFIELD A chair in snow should be like any other object whited & rounded and yet a chair in snow is always sad more than a bed more than a hat or house a chair is shaped for just one thing to hold a soul its quick and few […]

The Problem BY JANE HIRSHFIELD You are trying to solve a problem. You’re almost certainly halfway done, maybe more. You take some salt, some alum, and put it into the problem. Its color goes from yellow to royal blue. You tie a knot of royal blue into the problem, as into a Peruvian quipu of […]

(No Wind, No Rain) BY JANE HIRSHFIELD No wind, no rain, the tree just fell, as a piece of fruit does. But no, not fruit. Not ripe. Not fell. It broke. It shattered. One cone’s addition of resinous cell-sap, one small-bodied bird arriving to tap for a beetle. It shattered. What word, what act, was […]

Green-Striped Melons BY JANE HIRSHFIELD They lie under stars in a field. They lie under rain in a field. Under sun. Some people are like this as well— like a painting hidden beneath another painting. An unexpected weight the sign of their ripeness.

Harness BY JANE HIRSHFIELD Little soul, you and I will become the memory of a memory of a memory. A horse released of the traces forgets the weight of the wagon.

For What Binds Us BY JANE HIRSHFIELD There are names for what binds us: strong forces, weak forces. Look around, you can see them: the skin that forms in a half-empty cup, nails rusting into the places they join, joints dovetailed on their own weight. The way things stay so solidly wherever they’ve been set […]