Sappho, “And I said / I shall burn…”; Xenophon, Memorabilia III.11
The willingness to make a sacrifice—And I said / I shall burn—is an attempt to bribe the gods. I assume the fat thigh-bones of a white she-goat would be set afl...
Category: love
Emily Dickinson, “My River runs to thee” (162) & “Distance — is not the Realm of Fox” (1155)
Dickinson, utterly unshy about her desires, introduces a problem for those of us reading her. On the one hand, her frankness about sex is refreshing after so mu...
Ha Jin, “Missed Time”
I want to write about joy, but I wonder how other people conceive their legacies. I realize this sounds like a strange combination. For not a few of us, though,...
William Carlos Williams, “This Is Just To Say”
Derision is easy. I often tell myself that adults act out an extended version of high school. Somewhere between 14 and 18, our tastes form in some fundamental w...
Emily Dickinson, “I’ve nothing else — to bring, You know —” (224)
I’ve nothing else — to bring, You know — (224) Emily Dickinson I’ve nothing else — to bring, You know — So I keep bringing These — Just as the Night...