Ruth Hoberman

No one’s clear on how to live with wanting.
The dog snatches gloves from the table

Mark Rothko’s vast rectangles interpose
themselves. There’s this too: pink light h

fall on someone—who might be drinking a glass of water, reading a book, or pondering last night’s dream. Then not— while back home in the gene pool, I’m lounging with the New York Times reading about two thousand pound bombs. I stand with Israel, so many neighbors say. How I felt that first time at

“Is it not strange that sheep’s guts could hail souls out of men’s bodies?” Benedick asks as he listens to Balthasar sing and play his lute in Much Ado about Nothing.  “There’s part of me, lying on a page,” I sometimes think reading a poem, feeling delight, wonder, and perhaps a touch of envy. “Why