'the meeting' (sheena odle)

A poem arrives in my inbox from the lovely Sheena, a long-ago member of my monthly poetry group.

It's not from the exercise I offered earlier in the week, but originally came, some time ago, inspired by the Yeats poem I mentioned in yesterday's post ('Before the World Was Made').

I love this poem – the truths in it makes the hairs on my neck stand up – so asked Sheena's permission to reprint it here.


The Meeting

as I walked under the midnight tree
when moon-drenched grass  lapped the forest's pitch
I met a woman who looked like me
and I asked her  are you saint or bitch?  

it depends she said on the time of  Time
the one  inside is always here
men may change my name      my  crime
but they cannot  change the thing they fear

I looked in her eyes and saw the years
years  since the world     and those before
saw the tricks and saw the tears
and a life that wills its own fierce law

one turned away to the house  above
to the tender man and the tended hearth
one to the woods      where an  older love
deepened the  shadows on the path




© Sheena Odle