Blackbirdan online journal of literature and the artsSpring 2011 v10n1
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MATTHEW LITTLE

Translating Issa #32

             Today the sun broke cleanly from three days of clouds. The
14- and 15-year-olds I teach spent the morning writing poems. Most
were lists of skies: red sky, broad sky, night sky, star sky, glow, black
sky, morning sky, all over the world the same sky.
             Another teacher wondered how I had stayed dry. I said I
changed.

Just now leaving
the head of my long shadow
is spring’s first butterfly.  end


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