Linda Pastan is older, well-known US author who has been twice a finalist for the National Book Award and was Poet Laureate of Maryland in the 90s. This is the second Pastan collection I have (oops forgot to enter this one in my library!). The poetry in this collection ranges from the subjects of night, insomnia and the cosmos, to topics like:“On Installing Anne Bradstreet in the cathedral of St. John the Divine. Poet’s Corner”. and “Adam and Eve, by Lucius Cranach the Elder, 1526.” Pastan seems to have a lovely balance of intimacy and universality in her poetry that speaks for itself, but should bring the reader back to the collection again and again.

Late in October

Late in October, I watch
it all unravel—the whole
autumn leafery
succumbing to rain.
At the moment
of their most intensive beauty,
reds and yellows bleed
into each other
like dried paints on a palette—
those ghosts of pictures
never painted.

Perhaps beauty
is the mother of death,
not the other way around.
Perhaps the rain itself
is an answer: knives
of crystal, cleansing
and killing as it falls.
I turn from the window;
winter is coming next.
White will have
it’s own perfections. ( )