by Ellen Bryant Voigt
Thanksgiving Day was the day they slaughtered the hog the carcass
hoisted by its heels from the oak the planks across sawhorses holding
the hams the buckets catching the blood the shanks the organ meats
the chunks of white fat for biscuits the feet sunk in brine as the yard-dogs
whined for the leathery ear and my grandmother napped
with the baby always a baby needing a nap
my neighbor
at ninety-six claims she’s never had a nap she has no use for dogs
she used to spend Thanksgiving in the woods getting her deer
and strung it up outside the shed where now droops
head down rack down her son’s deer her knives
stay sharp one year her son brought by
not venison a yearling bear glossy and black
dressed out there wasn’t much underneath his thick coat
a scrawny frame the paws so much like hands she said
when she looked through the window it startled her
hanging there the size of a child
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ABOUT THE POET ~
Ellen Bryant Voigt is the author of several collections of poetry, most recently Headwaters: Poems (W. W. Norton, 2013); Messenger: New and Selected Poems 1976-2006 (W. W. Norton, 2007); Shadow of Heaven (W. W. Norton, 2002), which was a finalist for the National Book Award; Kyrie (W. W. Norton, 1995), a finalist for the National Book Critic’s Circle Award; Two Trees (W. W. Norton, 1992); The Lotus Flowers (W. W. Norton, 1987); The Forces of Plenty (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 1983); and Claiming Kin (Wesleyan University Press, 1976).
Last updated December 24, 2014