November 30, 2011:

The Three Emilys

These women crying in my head

Walk alone, uncomforted:

The emilys these three

Cry to be set free-

And others whom I will not name

Each different, each the same.

 

Yet they had liberty!

Their kingdom was the sky:

They batted clouds with easy hand,

Found a mountain for their stand:

From wandering lonely they could catch

The inner magic of a heath-

A lake their palette, any tree

Their bush could be.

 

And still they cry to me

As in reproach

I, born to hear their inner storm

Of separate man in woman’s form,

I yet possess another kingdom, barred

I move as mother in a frame,

My arteries

Flow the immemorial way

Towards the child, the man;

And only for brief span

 

Am I an Emily on mountain snows

And one of these.

 

And so the whole that I possess

Is still much less-

They move triumphant through my head:

I am the one

Uncomforted.