Listen to the foghorn open
the water's crinkly envelope:
such a deeply plaintive
voice that nothing wants
to answer. The sky darkens
but withholds the rain.
There are times when, inside
myself, I am lonely again
though I don't want to be.
Years ago, late at night,
I looked out of my window
to see you making your way
through powdery snow.
Has it been that many years?
In our home, we even have
two or more of some things—
flashlights, coffee pots,
tape measures. Once a day,
the rice cooker whistles softly
then pings when it's done.
We put tables and shelves
together; there are so many
books—it will take more than one
lifetime to walk through all
the countries in them. But if I go
alone, I will be lonely inside
myself again. Sometimes the quiet
is bearable, but never for long.
Poet Luisa A. Igloria (Poetry Foundation web page, author webpage ) was recently appointed Poet Laureate of the Commonwealth of Virginia (2020-2022). She is Co-Winner of the 2019 Crab Orchard Open Competition in Poetry for Maps for Migrants and Ghosts (Southern Illinois University Press, September 2020). She is the winner of the 2015 Resurgence Prize (UK), the world’s first major award for ecopoetry, selected by former UK poet laureate Sir Andrew Motion, Alice Oswald, and Jo Shapcott. She is the author of What is Left of Wings, I Ask (2018 Center for the Book Arts Letterpress Chapbook Prize, selected by former US Poet Laureate Natasha Trethewey); Bright as Mirrors Left in the Grass (Kudzu House Press eChapbook selection for Spring 2015), Ode to the Heart Smaller than a Pencil Eraser (Utah State University Press, 2014 May Swenson Prize), Night Willow (Phoenicia Publishing, 2014), The Saints of Streets (University of Santo Tomas Publishing House, 2013), Juan Luna’s Revolver (2009 Ernest Sandeen Prize, University of Notre Dame Press), and nine other books. She is a member of the core faculty of the MFA Creative Writing Program at Old Dominion University which she directed from 2009-2015; she also teaches classes at The Muse Writers’ Center in Norfolk. In 2018, she was the inaugural Glasgow Distinguished Writer in Residence at Washington and Lee University. When she isn’t writing, reading, or teaching, she cooks with her family, knits, hand-binds books, and listens to tango music.