Poem | January | Commonweal Magazine

I read a poem by Amichai to you:
“I’ll sing until my heart breaks.”
The great love of the word
between us, poem, prayer,
a psalm.

Winter is here now, ice
and the hunger of the chickadees
pushed out by squirrels
at the feeder, how the world
is for them.

Inside our house, the hard edge
of your illness makes relentless
war on your body, how the world
is for you.

Norita Dittberner-Jax has published four collections of poetry, most recently, Stopping For Breath from Nodin Press. Crossing The Water, her fifth collection, will be published by Nodin in June, 2017. Norita has won numerous awards and fellowships, among them several nominations for the Pushcart Prize. One of the poetry editors for Red Bird Chapbooks, Norita lives with her husband in Lilydale, Minnesota on the banks of the Mississippi River.