Poetry Break: The Gate

The Gate (M.A. Reilly, Tuscany, 2009)

The Gate

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BY MARIE HOWE

I had no idea that the gate I would step through 

to finally enter this world 

would be the space my brother's body made. He was 

a little taller than me: a young man 

but grown, himself by then, 

done at twenty-eight, having folded every sheet, 

rinsed every glass he would ever rinse under the cold 

and running water. 

This is what you have been waiting for, he used to say to me. 

And I'd say, What? 

And he'd say, This—holding up my cheese and mustard sandwich. 

And I'd say, What? 

And he'd say, This, sort of looking around. 

This

Paper City (M.A. Reilly, 2014)

This


       - Osip Mandelstam

Today, my love,
leaves are thrashing the wind
just as pedestrians are erecting again the buildings of this drab
forbidding city,
and our lives, as I lose track of them,
are the lives of others derailing in time and
getting things done.
Impossible to make sense of any one face
or mouth, though
each distance
is clear, and you are miles
from here.
Let your pure
space crowd my heart,
that we might stay awhile longer amid the flying
debris.
This moment,
I swear it,
isn't going anywhere.