Elizabeth AlexanderArs Poetica #10: Crossing Over
Like the low Shaker cradle sized for a diminished adult in which they rocked their elderly to death, or the five evangelical nurses who sang the Jewish woman to the precipice then told her to let go, go to Jesus in a humming circle. Like the mother of two sons who sent them away so they would not see their mother die, who refused the Shaker cradle. Like you, like our mother, who kept us as close for as long as she could then sent us away so she could.
Elizabeth Alexander is the author of three books of poems. Her most recent publication is the essays collection The Black Interior, from Graywolf Press. She teaches at Yale University.
