A Poem by Barbara Ras

Pregnant Poets Swim Lake Tarleton, New Hampshire
--For Emily Wheeler

You dive in, head for the other side, sure
that to swim a lake means to cross it,
whole. I am slow to follow,
repelled by edgewater rife with growth, the darker
suck of the deep. You lead,
letting go so surely you possess. I surrender.
Midlake we rest, breathless, let up our feet.
Our bellies are eight-month fruits
fabulous with weightlessness.
We have entered summer like a state of pasture,
pregnancy like a state of mind so full
nothing else can be.
Sharing this is simple: the surprise of a tomato
still perfect after days in a pocket.
Here is the circle made flesh.
How much water does it take to make blood?
Where do Tibetans get the conches
they blow to release the trapped sound of the sea?
Our talk slows to the lengthening loop of the blood,
pauses for tiny hands, tiny feet, to beat their say-so.
“Marianne” lasts as long as a complete sentence
before the next utterance floats up, “Moore.”
We are the gardens. We are the toads.
The season of wetness is upon us.
Leap. Leap for all the kingdoms
and all the waters,
the water that breaks,
the rain, the juice, the tide,
the dark water that draws light down to life.





Barbara Ras


The New American Poets: A Breadloaf Anthology