Poem

Taller

after Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s “Sonnet 43”

Image by: Ann Iverson

Published on:

September 12, 2022

Read time:

1 min.

How do you love you? May you count the ways.
Like rolling mountain rivers, paradise to sort,
Cascading fall of water where an aching heart can port,
Love you ’til grace pours through your very blood
And rain streams down, soaking every leaf and bud.
Walk with yourself on another sunlit road,
The path you call forgiven, forever lined in gold.
Hold up your arms in an everlasting praise.
Memories of the other life may you not refuse;
See your beauty in the shadow of all the silken days.
Count your worth so you might never lose
Sight of who you are in each and every breath.
Hold the mirror toward the face that you must always choose;
Tell the mountains and the valleys you are taller than your death.

Ann Iverson

Ann Iverson is the author of five poetry collections: Come Now to the Window, Definite Space, Art Lessons, Mouth of Summer, and No Feeling Is Final. She is also the author and illustrator of two children's books. She is a graduate of both the MALS and the MFA programs at Hamline University. Her poems have appeared in a wide variety of venues, including six features on Writer’s Almanac, and her poem "Plenitude" was set to a choral arrangement by composer Kurt Knecht. Her artwork has been featured in several art exhibits as well as in a permanent installation at the University of Minnesota Amplatz Children’s Hospital.

Cover image by Blake Carpenter.

Taller

after Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s “Sonnet 43”

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