Blackbird Archive
← v7n2, Fall 2008
Poetry · Volume 7, Number 2

Reconcile

Sarah Vap

The earliest light we know

is out there on the hill this evening, calling to us—

starlight is an ancient lilac, with a talent

for the fragile certainty:

there is a speck

of memory, then I was quiet.

What is true

from everlasting to everlasting:

I found a good place. Then I was quiet.

It’s sacrilege to imagine

how someone should or should not have

loved you, umpteenth time.

memorylovespirituality
Sarah Vap

Sarah Vap’s third collection of poems, Faulkner’s Rosary , is forthcoming from Saturnalia Books. She is the author of two books of poetry, American Spikenard (University of Iowa Press, 2007), winner of the 2006 Iowa Poetry Prize, and Dummy Fire (Saturnalia Books, 2007), winner of the 2006 Saturnalia Poetry Prize. She lives on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington, teaches at Olympic College, and serves as poetry editor for 42opus .