Sometimes in the use of verse one line or two can catch you and draw you in, I like this line:
Prisoners held in underground cells
imagine that they see daylight
when they remember the laughter of women
“Alive Together: New and Selected Poems” (Lisel Mueller)
mainly because it reminded me of a woman I know who had the most incredible laugh, one that sounded like the peel of bells and made me see daylight…
The Laughter Of Women
The laughter of women sets fire
to the Halls of Injustice
and the false evidence burns
to a beautiful white lightness
It rattles the Chambers of Congress
and forces the windows wide open
so the fatuous speeches can fly out
The laughter of women wipes the mist
from the spectacles of the old;
it infects them with a happy flu
and they laugh as if they were young again
Prisoners held in underground cells
imagine that they see daylight
when they remember the laughter of women
It runs across water that divides,
and reconciles two unfriendly shores
like flares that signal the news to each other
What a language it is, the laughter of women,
high-flying and subversive.
Long before law and scripture
we heard the laughter, we understood freedom.
Lisel Mueller
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