Integrity

A poem by Adrienne Cecile Rich (1929 – 2012)

the quality of being complete; unbroken condition; entirety

~ Webster

A wild patience has taken me this far

as if I had to bring to shore

a boat with a spasmodic outboard motor

old sweaters, nets, spray-mottled books

tossed in the prow

some kind of sun burning my shoulder-blades.

Splashing the oarlocks. Burning through.

Your fore-arms can get scalded, licked with pain

in a sun blotted like unspoken anger

behind a casual mist.

The length of daylight

this far north, in this

forty-ninth year of my life

is critical.

The light is critical: of me, of this

long-dreamed, involuntary landing

on the arm of an inland sea.

The glitter of the shoal

depleting into shadow

I recognize: the stand of pines

violet-black really, green in the old postcard

but really I have nothing but myself

to go by; nothing

stands in the realm of pure necessity

except what my hands can hold.

Nothing but myself?….My selves.

After so long, this answer.

As if I had always known

I steer the boat in, simply.

The motor dying on the pebbles

cicadas taking up the hum

dropped in the silence.

Anger and tenderness: my selves.

And now I can believe they breathe in me

as angels, not polarities.

Anger and tenderness: the spider’s genius

to spin and weave in the same action

from her own body, anywhere —

even from a broken web.

The cabin in the stand of pines

is still for sale. I know this. Know the print

of the last foot, the hand that slammed and locked the door,

then stopped to wreathe the rain-smashed clematis

back on the trellis

for no one’s sake except its own.

I know the chart nailed to the wallboards

the icy kettle squatting on the burner.

The hands that hammered in those nails

emptied that kettle one last time

are these two hands

and they have caught the baby leaping

from between trembling legs

and they have worked the vacuum aspirator

and stroked the sweated temples

and steered the boat there through this hot

misblotted sunlight, critical light

imperceptibly scalding

the skin these hands will also salve.

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Poems in English 

• Sonnet 71: No longer mourn for me when I am dead by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 70: That thou art blamed shall not be thy defect by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 6: Then let not winter’s ragged hand deface by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 69: Those parts of thee that the world’s eye doth view by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 68: Thus is his cheek the map of days outworn by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 67: Ah, wherefore with infection should he live by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 66: Tired with all these, for restful death I cry by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 65: Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 64: When I have seen by Time’s fell hand defaced by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 63: Against my love shall be, as I am now by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 62: Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 61: Is it thy will thy image should keep open by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 60: Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 5: Those hours, that with gentle work did frame by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 59: If there be nothing new, but that which is by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 58: That god forbid, that made me first your slave by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 57: Being your slave, what should I do but tend by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 56: Sweet love, renew thy force, be it not said by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 55: Not marble, nor the gilded monuments by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 95: How sweet and lovely dost thou make the shame by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare

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