Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

FIRST by CLARENCE MAJOR

Poet Analysis

First Line: A WOMAN IS SITTING IN A DOORWAY
A woman is sitting in a doorway
of a thatched-roof house.
Paul is painting her as part
of the background
for The Great Tree.
Up close, I realize the woman
is my mother and she's in a trance.
In the single eye in her head
she sees the wall
that separates her life
from her death.
Her first memory is red
and cold, wet and cold.
Her last is like the first.


Used with the permission of Copper Canyon Press, P.O. Box 271, Port Townsend, WA
98368-0271, www.cc.press.org


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