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About Poet Laureate

I And Thou

Christina Pugh

I AND THOU

Must we cultivate our kindness? Can we
 

book a fellow-feeling for the sake of the fellow,
 

not the Ghost? Last night, for example, the white-
 

haired girl told us singing was like praying; and that
 

iron of naturalized note in the bluegrass made me
 

want to say sublime, sublime to myself, in the Sapphic
 

sense that knows sublimity as love (O wash me
 

green as yonder field); and the girl’s reed song did
 

light from the stage, constellating phrases like Heavens
 

divided in a quaver formed between forte and whisper,
 

acute supple wavers among syllables and slants: and
 

now may you keep me close within your ear; I can hear
 

the voice I loved when I wondered at its dialect—
 

you know, if I’m ever able to speak, I’ll want
 

someone human to answer me.