Sunday, May 3, 2009

The Secret

Two girls discover
the secret of life
in a sudden line of
poetry.

I who don't know the
secret wrote
the line. They
told me

(through a third person)
they had found it
but not what it was
not even

what line it was. No doubt
by now, more than a week
later, they have forgotten
the secret,

the line, the name of
the poem. I love them
for finding what
I can't find,

and for loving me
for the line I wrote,
and for forgetting it
so that

a thousand times, till death
finds them, they may
discover it again, in other
lines

in other
happenings. And for
wanting to know it,
for

assuming there is
such a secret, yes,
for that
most of all.

by Denise Levertov

1 comment:

  1. Melissa, Thanks for posting this poem. It is true how one line can open up some enormous truth for us in a blink of the eye and we might not remember where we read the line.

    I like your site. I worked with special students back in a former life, 28 years for State of NC.

    ReplyDelete