Those Winter Sundays BY ROBERT HAYDEN

Sundays too my father got up early and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold, then with cracked hands that ached from labor in the weekday weather made banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him. I’d wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking. When the rooms were warm, he’d call, and slowly I would rise and dress, fearing the chronic angers of that house, Speaking indifferently to him, who had driven out the cold and polished my good shoes as well. What did I know, what did I know of love’s austere and lonely offices? Robert Hayden, “Those Winter Sundays” from Collected Poems of Robert Hayden, edited by Frederick Glaysher. Copyright ©1966 by Robert Hayden. Reprinted with the permission of Liveright Publishing Corporation.

Tunnel by Zita Izso

One reason for our being unable to become intimate might be that we are scared of warmth; that we're afraid former confessions would emerge, like text fingered into the moisture when someone breathes against the windowpane. We might succeed if someone built a tunnel under our houses; one so long that after days of wandering we couldn't tell days and nights apart, wouldn't know when to wake up or do our routine tasks; when to eat, drink or quarrel; when to start being frightened. Now we are like those dead who are resurrected in the night. They do the same as any decent person would: they desperately try to get back to sleep. Zita Izso (Translated by Agnes Marton)

So Much by Annie Fisher

Peel back your glove, touch green, touch grain, Touch this good earth and then let go, Touch wing, touch web, touch root and rain, Peel back your glove, touch green, touch grain, Touch bud, touch curl of leaf, touch vein, Touch flint, touch fern, one flake of snow, Peel back your glove, touch green, touch grain. Touch this good earth; and then let go. ~Annie Fisher