On [:] Open-heart surgery | Anne Sexton, 1928-1974

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1 thought on “On [:] Open-heart surgery | Anne Sexton, 1928-1974

  1. The Waiting Head

    If I really am walking with ordinary habit
    past the same rest home on the same local street
    and see another waiting head at that upper front window,
    just as she would always sit,
    watching for anyone from her wooden seat,
    then anything can be true. I only know
    how each night she wrote in her leather books
    that no one came. Surely I remember the hooks
    of her fingers curled on mine, though even now
    will not admit the times I did avoid this street,
    where she lived on and on like a bleached fig
    and forgot us anyhow;
    visiting the pulp of her kiss, bending to repeat
    each favor, trying to comb out her mossy wig
    and forcing love to last. Now she is always dead
    and the leather books are mine. Today I see the head
    move, like some pitted angel, in that high window.
    What is the waiting head doing? It looks the same.
    Will it lean forward as I turn to go?
    I think I hear it call to me below

    but no one came no one came
    .

    Anne Sexton

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