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I read there are things out in space called quasars. Nobody really knows what they are. I hadn’t heard of them, so I looked it up, and it said: “An extremely remote celestial object, emitting exceptionally large amounts of energy.” They look like stars. Scientists think they have black holes inside them, but that maybe they’re the beginnings of new galaxies.

Imagine, a whole new galaxy in the process of being born. There’s hope in that, isn’t there? I think that’s hope.

Danita, Quasars

In twin chairs by the lakeside tonight
we’ve watched day’s last light

spread like a bright blush over treetops
past the point where cabins stand

abandoned, sealed against winter.
In the middle distance the island floats,

fading. There alone the wild blueberries
hang like unmarked globes over water

separating shore from shore.
Why they grow there but not here

puzzles, like love or the coming bereavements
of autumn, or rumors of empty, drifting skiffs.

For now at least the island remains
part and not part of the unknowing night

as we are to each other
island and mainland, ship and shore,

a familiar place; a mystery.

Anniversary, Exclusions & Limitations

Educate girls and there will be no more guillotines. That is what my father told me.

My father knew nothing about girls.

Madame, Charlotte's Letters

She is making herself and not herself—
anguish dressed in baroque repose,

a motionlessness that is never still,
arranged, betraying nothing—

the restrained line of an eyebrow or lip,
the arc of a neck, the skillful reflection

of a sleeve of the moon-white gown
in the olive-green water

gradually assembled, balanced there
in this unexpected moment,

this small world holding its breath.

(From White, Midlist Press First Series Award for Poetry)

from Susanna and the Elders, White

Jennifer O’Grady is a widely produced, published and award-winning playwright, and a widely published, award-winning poet and the author of two poetry books. Welcome to Jennifer’s website!