Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, DEAFNESS, by WINIFRED VIRGINIA JACKSON


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

DEAFNESS, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Wall-mountain rimmed around the sky
Last Line: "he heard! He spoke!"" she said."
Subject(s): Deafness; Man-woman Relationships; Male-female Relations


Wall-mountain rimmed around the sky
And bellied down, a bowl
With chipped and crackled edge; the farm
Dropped in like leaf-lopped cole.

Scrub trees crouched low on mountainside,
Their fingers locked and bared
Upon black rocks; at base great spruce
Stood close and leaned and stared.

The house, with up-curled shingles, hugged
The ground, a silent thing,
Like a gray bird squatting on its perch
In a cage, and cannot sing.

When she went up to bake for him,
To tend the house and such,
His deafness was a sorry chafe
She pitied overmuch.

A day came when he ceased to speak;
She did not care, for he
Was far more ugly in his speech
Than there was need to be.

But when the long days dragged on by
Without a word from him,
The crumbs of peace fell from her mind
As leaves drop from a limb.

At first she zigzagged in her mind
'Twixt old Hen Levy's Place
And his: she knew Four Corners brooked
No showing of her face.

And then she planned shrill words to shriek
To stab his deafness through;
And he would watch, with cunning eye.
Her stirred mind's boil and brew.

Then slyly he would egg her on:
He'd cup his ear with hand,
The while her throat rasped hoarse with words
She hoped he's understand.

In summer loneliness was lulled
By birds that came to sing;
An old black creaker, by the door,
Was always a friendly thing.

Slim poplars grew close to the barn
And whispered all day long;
The Plymouth Rocks scratched in their shade
And cackled or made song.

But in the winter when the jays
Sat shrieking, limb to limb,
It seemed somehow that he must hear; --
That she must talk with him.

And when a lone, lean crow would light
Upon a fire-stubbed pine,
It seemed a black thought from her heart,
That blurred her brain like wine.

One day a storm drove down; the wind
Banked snow in drifts on farm,
Encircling, with one deep drift,
The house like a gripping arm.

She shoveled a path from house to barn;
The cattle must be fed:
He let them go a day and night --
At her plea shook his head.

The crow came to the barn that night;
She took care of the cat;
The crow, on top-loft ladder's round,
In brooding silence sat.

When Sunday came the storm had cleared.
Some city folks snow-shoed
Through Toby's Gap to Brimmer's Place,
And one of them, a dude,

Was cold, and knocked upon the door;
When no one answered, he
Just turned the knob and went on in --
To see what he could see.

Old Aaron sat, bound in a chair;
His face was snarled with fear;
His hair cut off'n him quite close;
His throat cut, ear to ear.

She sat in a rocker, muttering,
A-waggling of her head;
But when she saw the dude, she rose: --
"He heard! He spoke!" she said.





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