I Stop Writing the Poem by Tess Gallagher

Tess Gallagher

I Stop Writing the Poem by Tess Gallagher

T.

Tess Gallagher is Raymond Carver’s wife. I think she wrote this after he died. More of the discussion (well, notes, really)

here

. It is raining again.

Michael Whalen’s

I Have Loved You for a Thousand Lifetimes

is on repeat.

I Stop Writing the Poem

Tess Gallagher

to fold the clothes. No matter who lives

or who dies, I’m still a woman.

I’ll always have plenty to do.

I bring the arms of his shirt

together. Nothing can stop

our tenderness. I’ll get back

to the poem. I’ll get back to being

a woman. But for now

there’s a shirt, a giant shirt

in my hands, and somewhere a small girl

standing next to her mother

watching to see how it’s done.

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