Borders

"The poetry of Mary Crow is as we would expect of an artist deeply troubled by her experiences. The writing is taut, lean with the struggle to persevere and become its own true cause; and by the grace and the power of her art, the poems in Borders are kept from vanishing into the pain itself, thereby making a voice and presence for herself that is the fulfillment of her search for self. In short, she is the quintessential artist who is made whole by the very processes of art. Let us welcome Mary Crow to the company of poets." —David Ignatow


Weight of the Day

Glare, hot lights, relentless
groan of traffic, legless beggar
whose monotonous voice
pursues me down the street:
Señorita, por favor, señorita...
At breast level, two machine guns:
black eyes, deep and empty.
Everything is so clean!
No droppings, only a chirping
from the top of a tree.
From a distant street,
the dry plucking of a siren
trills our taut nerves.