THISTLES
for Persia
Under ledge, under tar, under fill
under curved blue stone of doorsteps,
under the aggregate of lakebed rock,
under loss and under hard words,
under steamrollers
under your heart,
it doesn't matter. They can live forever.
The seeds of thistles
push from nowhere, forming a rose of spikes
that spreads all summer until it
stands in a glory of
needles, blossoms, blazing
purple clubs and fists.
— Louise Erdrich,
from Original Fire: Selected and New Poems,
HarperCollins Publishers, 2003
Uni-verse
We all overestimated the world.
~ Joseph Roth
