Poem of the Week: Jeff Gundy

A Day at the Pond Without Geese A good day for late wildflowers--daisies and burrs leaned out into the path for a better view, brilliant blue somethings with tiny blooms on tall stalks. A good day for a young dog's yapping, the splish of a muskrat, thin gold of poplar leaves screening the low sun. At the end of a lush summer, not much has changed. The latest suicide bomber was nearly done with law school. The enemy shot her brother. Afterwards her head was found on the floor of the restaurant in Haifa, black hair still flowing. Like most men in such times, I want to give advice. The pond is pretty in its small way, trees still green, a bank of cattails, water echoing blurry greens and sky, for once no geese to harry and complicate things. Two quiet wrens, that dog yelping stupidly, and a crow way off to the east. Like most men, I think I'm smarter than most men. I dream of women even when I'm awake. If I sit long enough, the trees or the water will surely tell me something. A woman passes, explaining to her cell phone as she walks. As far as I can see, everything is calm as Eden. Her black hair, flowing like the night. - Jeff Gundy From Spoken among the Trees (Akron, 2007). Used by permission. Jeff Gundy's eight books of poetry and prose include Spoken among the Trees (Akron, 2007), Deerflies (WordTech Editions, 2004), and Scattering Point: The World in a Mennonite Eye (SUNY, 2003). He teaches at Bluffton University, and was a 2008 Fulbright lecturer in American Studies at the University of Salzburg. Gundy appeared on the panel "The Peace Shelves: Essential Books and Poems for the 21st Century" during Split This Rock Poetry Festival: Poems of Provocation & Witness 2010. Please feel free to forward Split This Rock Poem of the Week widely. We just ask you to include all of the information in this email, including this request. Thanks! Split This Rock www.splitthisrock.org info@splitthisrock.org 202-787-5210