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Rest before you sleep
- Article from:
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Poetry
- Article date:
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September 1, 2008
- Author:
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Copyright informationCopyright Poetry Foundation Sep 2008. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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Requiem after Fauré, for my father
Rest before you sleep You'll be walking for hours
then as usual away from home your shoes
in your hand your feet not yet used to the road
Perhaps they need to feel the gravel
to know where they're headed
A woman I knew who lived mostly in the woods
mentioned the danger in presuming to know
what an animal thinks The fox for example
stopping by her open tent and looking in
I suppose she would've felt this way about your feet
She would've said how could anyone know
what a pair of tired feet need along the way
I would've asked her how she knew the feet
were tired Such discourse produces nothing
but anything less would be silence
and that would be intolerable
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