The Darkened Temple

by L'Esperance, Mari

• ISBN13: 9780803218475
• ISBN10: 0803218478
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-09-01
• Publisher: Univ of Nebraska Pr

Summary

"Longing itself is nothing but the heart's open spaces," writes Mari L'Esperance. And in the open spaces at the heart of these poems is a mother who has disappeared. In a world of war and displacement, illness of the mind and body, imprisonment and violence both historical and personal, the poet leads her readers through a landscape of loss. In unadorned language, she draws readers into the interplay between articulation and silence-and finally offers a vision of redemption.

Author Biography

Mari L’Esperance’s poems have appeared in Pequod, the Beloit Poetry Journal, Barnabe Mountain Review, and Salamander, as well as numerous other journals. Her chapbook, Begin Here, was awarded first prize in the 1999 Sarasota Poetry Theatre Press national chapbook competition.

Table of Contents

Fog: memory	p. 1
The Bush Warbler Laments to the Woodcutter	p. 5
After Reading of the Expatriate Writer's Death by Shipwreck: Margaret Fuller, 1850	p. 7
In the Valley of the Kings	p. 9
Stroke	p. 10
Something Coming Apart	p. 11
Kamakura	p. 14
Returning to Earth	p. 16
The Doll Maker	p. 17
Pantoum of the Blind Cambodian Women	p. 18
Another History	p. 20
Diagnosis	p. 22
Trio	p. 23
Prayer	p. 25
The Last Time I Saw Her	p. 29
The Search	p. 30
Trying to Carry It	p. 31
The Shoes	p. 32
Caught	p. 33
Where the Body Might Be, the Mind Follows -	p. 34
Dark House	p. 37
Beyond It	p. 38
Finding My Mother	p. 39
Forgetting	p. 41
To Her Body	p. 42
The Book of Ash	p. 44
Grief Is Deep Green	p. 45
For My Mother's Birthday	p. 47
White Hydrangeas as a Way Back to the Self	p. 48
Begin Here	p. 61
What's Possible	p. 62
After Fire	p. 63
Two Maples	p. 64
This Hour Passing	p. 65
To My Father, Living for a Long Time in Another Country	p. 67
The Choices Not Made	p. 68
Last Hour With His Dead Wife	p. 70
Longing	p. 71
Map of the World	p. 72
Happiness and Happenstance Share the Same Root	p. 73
Epistle	p. 74
The Night Garden	p. 75
How It Happens	p. 76
Nocturne	p. 78
As Told by Three Rivers	p. 79
Notes	p. 81
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