Praise Prepositions
Jeanne Murray Walker
November 1, 2006
After against among, around. How I admire
prepositions, small as they are,
like safety pins, their lives given to
connecting. They are the paid help,
maids in black uniforms who pass
hors d'oeuvres, and they're
the forbidden joy that leaps between us
when we get to know them. Without
connection what can survive? Because
the lawn waits for sun to wake it from
its winter nap, we say sunlight
lies on the grass. Even the simplest jar
connects—jar under moonlight, on
counter, jar in water. It was prepositions
in the Valley of Dry Bones that stitched
the femur to the heel, heel to the foot bone.
And afterwards, they got up to dance.
Between, beside, within may yet keep
the precarious chins and breasts
from tumbling off Picasso's women.
I would make prepositions the stars of grammar
like the star that traveled the navy sky
the night sweet Jesus lay in his cradle,
pulling those kings toward Bethlehem,
and us behind them, trekking
from the rim of history toward Him.
—Jeanne Murray Walker is professor of English at the University of Delaware. A poet and playwright, she is the author most recently of A Deed to the Light (Univ. of Illinois Press). This poem was first published in The Christian Century.
Copyright © 2006 by the author or Christianity Today International/Books & Culture magazine.
Click here for reprint information on Books & Culture.
 |
|  |
 | | | | Try an Issue of Books & Culture
RISK-FREE!
|
 |
|
No credit card required. Please allow 4-6 weeks for delivery. Offer valid in U.S. only. Click here for International orders.
If you decide you want to keep Books & Culture coming, honor your invoice for just $19.95 and receive five more issues, a full year in all. If not, simply write "cancel" across the invoice and return it. The trial issue is yours to keep, regardless.
Give Books & Culture as a gift
Buy 1 gift subscription, get 1 FREE!
|
| | | | |
 |
|  |
| 
Find similar articles
Print this article
E-mail this page
Bookmark this article
