what a hard time
the Hudson River has had
trying to get to the sea

it seemed easy enough to
rise out of Tear of
the Cloud and tumble
and run in little skips
and jumps   draining
                a swamp here and
    there   acquiring
streams and other smaller
rivers with similar
longings for the wide
imagined water
 
suddenly
there’s Poughkeepsie
except for its spelling
an ordinary town but
the great heaving
ocean sixty miles away is
determined to reach
that town every day
and twice a day in fact
drowning the Hudson River
in salt and mud
it is the moon’s tidal
power over all the waters
of this earth at war with
gravity     the Hudson
perseveres    moving down
down    dignified
slower    look it has
become our Lordly Hudson
hardly flowing
                 and we are
now in a poem by the poet
Paul Goodman  be quiet heart
home home
                 then the sea

- Grace Paley

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Poetry - Schmoetry. Stuff that rhyme and shit.

Books by Grace Paley: