Postcard from Denise Levertov: Poem "The Secret"


The Secret


Two girls discover
the secret of life
in a sudden line of
poetry.

I who don't know the
secret wrote
the line. They
told me

(through a third person)
they had found it
but not what it was
not even

what line it was. No doubt
by now, more than a week
later, they have forgotten
the secret,

the line, the name of
the poem. I love them
for finding what
I can't find,

and for loving me
for the line I wrote,
and for forgetting it
so that

a thousand times, till death
finds them, they may
discover it again, in other
lines

in other
happenings. And for
wanting to know it,
for

assuming there is
such a secret, yes,
for that
most of all.



~ By Denise Levertov



~ Kells

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Comments

  1. I saved this to post a comment about a poem it reminded of, but now (in keeping with Denise's poem, of course), I can't remember what poem it reminded me of!

    ReplyDelete

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