All the Way to the Bone

Vern Rutsala

Words from the East
filter through

the leaves, whispering
news of the dead

you can’t stand to hear,
but you do stand

there and listen,
suffering this soft

storm of something
like snow, something

like confetti made
of hail, a language

no one understands,
yet it aches all the way

to the bone.
There is nothing

out there, nothing
to know—only

vacancy, only atoms
returning to earth,

only a whimpering
darkness and every

verb falling into
the past tense forever.

Vern Rutsala received his BA from Reed College and his MFA from the University of Iowa. He is the author of numerous poetry books, including The Moment’s Equation, which was a finalist for the National Book Award in Poetry. Among his awards are a Guggenheim Fellowship, two National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships, the Richard Snyder Prize, and the Kenneth O. Hanson Award. He taught at Lewis & Clark College from 1961–2004.

“All the Way to the Bone” appears in our Winter 2011 issue.