Wendy Taylor Carlisle lives in Texas.  She is the author of two books, Reading Berryman to the Dog (2000) and Discount Fireworks (2008) and two chapbooks, After Happily Ever and The Storage of Angels.  Notes about her poems on line and in print appear on her website, wendytaylorcarlisle.com   

Carlisle says: "'The Physical World' concerns a classical Indian vocalist who it was said jumped to her death from a second story roof.  I knew her slightly and read her obituary with sadness and disbelief.  This poem considers her suicide."

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The Physical World

by Wendy Taylor Carlisle  

Indian classical singer...'jumps to death.'
    Headline: Independent Bangladesh

the truth, the feet, the drought
under the spring mud
the woman, The greatest

poverty is not to live
in a physical world, says Stevens. 
Fact is our teeth will outlast us,

and this year’s grain
rots in our bellies while we live on
the dullness of matter.

Hunger that sticks to your fur
blooms elsewhere.
We have only to consider

a beautiful singer; ask what
the roof knows, what the rain knows
what the dirt knows.