needs the soil and the soil needs the grass,
the way the candle needs the wick
and the wick needs the candle. Yes
to the way the lion and the buck need
one another, and the bluebird the caterpillar.
To the ocean that needs a shore for its waves.
Yes to the cymbals for needing the violins
and violins for needing the winds,
to the four winds and the sixteen
quarter winds and the thirty-two winds
it takes to make a compass rose.
Yes to each rose petal that needs the other
forty petals to be a rose, and to the rose
for enfolding all the petals before
letting them die for the new bud.
And I say yes to the stars closing their eyes
at the same time to share the darkness,
yes to the viaduct of rain in the valley
of thirst, yes to the time we live with
because we’ve got to live with it,
yes to loving better, to coming in
from anywhere.
Wendy Drexler’s third poetry collection, Before There Was Before, was published by Iris Press in 2017. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in The Atlanta Review, Barrow Street, J Journal, Nimrod, Prairie Schooner, Salamander, The Mid-American Review, The Hudson Review, The Threepenny Review, The Worcester Review, and the Valparaiso Poetry Review, among others; featured on Verse Daily and WBUR’s Cognoscenti; and in numerous anthologies. She’s the poet in residence at New Mission High School in Hyde Park, MA.
