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Margaret and Henry by Moonlight*

Spinning under the full moon

Henry and Margaret at either end

Of a small flat boat:

Margaret gazing up,

Breathless in falling stars,

Her heart wild with Shelley

And fire;

Henry peering down

At spindly waterbugs

Scooting along the brackish crest.

 

Around and round they spin

In this grey-ghost glimmering light,

An ovenbird echoing nearby,

Reflections bursting like tiny bites

Off the wake,

Margaret corseted in camlet and brocade,

Henry used to wading nude in the Assabet,

Wearing only his hat.

 

Precarious on the water

In this precarious life,

Silent they—not friends, not comfortable

Together, not today—

But locked in spinning still

Beneath the moon,

Each in his or her particular

Peculiar own way.

* Henry Thoreau, the writer, once took Margaret Fuller, the editor, out in his boat in the middle of Walden Pond on a moonlit night. She still wouldn’t publish his work.
Posted on Wednesday, August 22, 2007 at 08:59PM by Registered CommenterLinda Brown Holt | CommentsPost a Comment

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