Mary's Duties

    He is rid away to the tenant¹ farms

    and I take up my pen to list

    the shakings-out and openings.

    And my thin letters lean as sails

    that， though driven， cannot arrive.

    May the ninth， I write.

    And： Mrs. Ferguson.

    Unbutton the bed pillows

    and plump them to the air.

    Then： Take the curtains down

    and with your broom unseat

    the spiders' webs. Open

    the windows and leave them

    wide and here the thread trails

    off， among the cottages

    with their spring festoons of eggs

    pricked² with pins and blown，

    fragile as the blacksmith's daughter

    dreaming in the sun， who lifts

    her skirts above her white knees.

    I pull back behind a hedge.

    Let her not meet me， with my dry pen