The following two poems both appear in Franz Wright's collection WALKING TO MARTHA'S VINEYARD, winner of the 2004 Pulitzer Prize in Poetry.

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My Place

     for Beth



Rain land, walnut blossoms raining
white
where I walk at sixteen

bright light in the north wind

Still sleeping bees at the grove's heart
(my heart's) till the sun
its "wake now"
kiss, the million
friendly gold huddlings
and burrowings of them hearing the shining
wind
I hear, my only
cure for the loneliness I go through:

more.

I believe that one day the distance between myself and God will disappear.



***



On Earth



Ressurection of the little apple tree outside
my window, leaf-
light of late
in the April
called her eyes, forget
forget
but how
How does one go
about dying?
Who on earth
is going to teach me—
The world is filled with people
who have never died





 

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From WALKING TO MARTHA'S VINEYARD by Franz Wright. © 2003 by Franz Wright. Excerpted by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

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Related links:

About WALKING TO MARTHA'S VINEYARD:
http://www.randomhouse.com/knopf/catalog/display.pperl?0375710019

About Franz Wright:
http://www.randomhouse.com/knopf/catalog/results2.pperl?authorid=33786

Read a review of WALKING TO MARTHA'S VINEYARD:
http://csmonitor.com/2004/0420/p16s03-bogn.html

View an interactive map of Martha's Vineyard:
http://www.mvol.com/maps/flash/mvmap.php

Read more Franz Wright and listen to him read aloud:
http://randomhouse.com/knopf/authors/franzwright/poem.html

Discuss "My Place" and "On Earth" in the Knopf Poetry Forum:
http://www.aaknopf.com/poetry/forum

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