Blackbird ArchiveAfter a Long Drought
The summer is gray this unusual evening.
Rain slips down from the sky
and lands quietly
as if it meant to overpower someone sleeping.
Water rings swarm across the surface of the bay
and it’s the only surface there is—
the other is height and depth,
to rise and to fall.
The trunks of two pines
shoot up and extend into long hollow signal drums.
Gone are the cities and the sun.
There’s lightning in the tall grass.
It’s possible to call the mirage island.
It’s possible to hear the gray voice.
Iron ore is honey for the lightning.
It’s possible to live by your code.
Tomas Tranströmer, recipient of the 2011 Nobel Prize for Literature, is the author of nineteen collections of poetry in his native country of Sweden and is widely recognized as one of the country’s leading poets. Tranströmer is the recipient of many awards and honors in Sweden and worldwide, including the Swedish Award of the International Poetry Forum, the Bonnier Award for Poetry, the Neustadt International Prize for Literature, the Petrarch Prize in Germany, the Golden Wreath of the Struga Poetry Evenings and a Griffin Poetry Prize Lifetime Recognition Award in 2007. Many of his collections have been translated into English, including The Sorrow Gondola (Green Integer, 2010), The Great Enigma: Collected Poems (New Directions, 2006), and The Half-Finished Heaven: The Best Poems of Tomas Tranströmer (Graywolf Press, 2001).
Patty Crane’s poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in American Letters & Commentary , Bellevue Literary Review, RUNES, The Massachusetts Review, The Spoon River Poetry Review, and West Branch , among other journals. Her awards include the 2004 Two Rivers Review Poetry Prize and Atlanta Review’s 2005 International Publication Prize.