Women

 Women have no wilderness in them, 
They are provident instead, 
Content in the tight hot cell of their hearts 
To eat dusty bread.
 

They do not see cattle cropping red winter grass,
They do not hear 
Snow water going down under culverts 
Shallow and clear.
 

They wait, when they should turn to journeys, 
They stiffen, when they should bend.
 
They use against themselves that benevolence 
To which no man is friend.
 

They cannot think of so many crops to a field 
Or of clean wood cleft by an axe.
 
Their love is an eager meaninglessness 
Too tense or too lax.
 

They hear in any whisper that speaks to them 
A shout and a cry.
 
As like as not, when they take life over their door-sill 
They should let it go by.

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