{"id":1215,"date":"2018-05-10T21:28:32","date_gmt":"2018-05-11T01:28:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/umaine.edu\/spire\/?p=1215"},"modified":"2018-05-10T21:28:32","modified_gmt":"2018-05-11T01:28:32","slug":"hildebrandt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/umaine.edu\/spire\/2018\/05\/10\/hildebrandt\/","title":{"rendered":"A Collection of Poems by Lenore Hildebrandt"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lenore Hildebrandt<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

Thinking Potatoes<\/h2>\n
\n

French Fingerlings. Magic Molly.
\nIn a shallow box by the window
\nthis year\u2019s tubers warm to the thought
\nof growing. They understand fertility
\nas a sequence of moves. Fuzzy sprouts
\npush from the dust-shriveled skin,
\neyes urge toward an opening.<\/p>\n

Obliging, I will place each tuber
\ninto the soil of their dark-days
\nlike others before me\u2014a line of planters
\nwho have bent over shallow trenches,
\nwho have hilled and watered
\nand in summer marveled at elegant plants
\nbearing white and purple blooms.<\/p>\n

The strength of these earth companions\u2014
\nto burrow down and resurrect.
\nIn the Andes, the world-mother is offered
\na meal and a sprinkling of chicha.
\nDoes she fathom the depth of our hunger?
\nCradled in my hand, this nightshade
\noffers something like a future.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

Two Logs<\/h2>\n
\n

I thought of Galileo, how he sifted numbers
\nrearranging and probing the assumptions\u2014
\nthen the spheres expanded. A sea-change!<\/p>\n

Today they brought in a boy on a stretcher, put him down.
\nI heard him moan\u2014then it was quiet.<\/i><\/p>\n

The days advance too fast\u2014our divers pressuring on,
\nsinking through a curtain of silt. Like the calcific shells
\nwe assess, they are worn thin by the sea.<\/p>\n

Later I went back to look at his body and saw
\nhow small, how frail the bones.<\/i><\/p>\n

Geese hover by the reef\u2014my bold singers.
\nThe waves are folding under, the sea taking
\nthe gravel beach. Some days seem merely adrift.<\/p>\n

His family may never know… Whole villages
\nhave been cracked open, buried under.<\/i><\/p>\n

We count minutia\u2014the sea\u2019s smallest creatures
\nthat feed both hunter and the hunted\u2013\u2013our computations
\ndesperately elegant: curves, correlations, hyperlinks.<\/p>\n

Everyone is hungry. Fish and rice. The poorest,
\ninvisibly, flock back across the coastal lowlands.<\/i><\/p>\n

The sea lies open in wide troughs\u2014our yearning.
\nWhen Galileo shattered the spheres, he blushed\u2014
\nhis heart, too, a rising ocean.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

After Learning<\/h2>\n
\n

I ran to the margins bordering north
\nwhere the land ends and the sea ends.
\nIn the quiet, I could hear my own heartbeat.<\/p>\n

When I tried to stop thinking, space rushed in,
\nuncontrollably. The water at my feet
\ndid not trouble itself over me, so I stayed\u2014<\/p>\n

at least the ocean was right in its fervor.
\nThe wind acted friendly sometimes,
\nsweeping through, cooling heads,<\/p>\n

but terribly, I doubted
\nmy own clinging\u2014that history
\nmight have taught us.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lenore Hildebrandt Thinking Potatoes French Fingerlings. Magic Molly. In a shallow box by the window this year\u2019s tubers warm to the thought of growing. They understand fertility as a sequence of moves. Fuzzy sprouts push from the dust-shriveled skin, eyes urge toward an opening. Obliging, I will place each tuber into the soil of their […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1194,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1215","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-spire-2018-issue"],"yoast_head":"\nA Collection of Poems by Lenore Hildebrandt - The Maine Journal of Conservation and Sustainability - University of Maine<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/umaine.edu\/spire\/2018\/05\/10\/hildebrandt\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Collection of Poems by Lenore Hildebrandt - The Maine Journal of Conservation and Sustainability - University of Maine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Lenore Hildebrandt Thinking Potatoes French Fingerlings. Magic Molly. In a shallow box by the window this year\u2019s tubers warm to the thought of growing. They understand fertility as a sequence of moves. Fuzzy sprouts push from the dust-shriveled skin, eyes urge toward an opening. 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