On the Back of the Note I Left You When I Went out I Have Written This Ode
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On the Back of the Note I Left You When I Went out I Have Written This Ode Author(s): Christopher Howell Source: The Iowa Review, Vol. 10, No. 4 (Fall, 1979), p. 22 Published by: University of Iowa Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20140273 . Accessed: 13/06/2014 01:28 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. . University of Iowa is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Iowa Review. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 62.122.79.52 on Fri, 13 Jun 2014 01:28:33 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
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Transcript of On the Back of the Note I Left You When I Went out I Have Written This Ode
On the Back of the Note I Left You When I Went out I Have Written This OdeAuthor(s): Christopher HowellSource: The Iowa Review, Vol. 10, No. 4 (Fall, 1979), p. 22Published by: University of IowaStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20140273 .
Accessed: 13/06/2014 01:28
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp
.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].
.
University of Iowa is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Iowa Review.
http://www.jstor.org
This content downloaded from 62.122.79.52 on Fri, 13 Jun 2014 01:28:33 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
On the Back of the Note I Left You When I Went Out I Have Written This Ode Christopher Howell
Scraping my shoes on the last stars just now as I came in I saw your body shimmer as the soul slipped out
tipping its hat to the air and the imperturbable room. Darkly in lampglow your wondrous hair calls out
to Russian peasants
dreaming in your coded blood. The next room or century is where I speak from. But they are only time and space, nothing to the ocean your sleeping
wings across, seeking the deep ancestral roads of Anapola for the exact cheek bones and broken smile
your Zadie brought in that grey ship rocking.
Did he look at the moon the whole way as you do when we travel
through the night? As you do now somewhere over darkened water?
It is such damaged truth the heart requests.
And so I send this on
by some messenger who knows where best moonlight is burning from a Russian face.
May it find you as voice finds flesh in every season: luminous
and new, homing down the flyways of the blood.
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This content downloaded from 62.122.79.52 on Fri, 13 Jun 2014 01:28:33 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
