To Maps

When I was just learning to drive, I had to go to the downtown library, so Mom and I pulled out the city of Dallas Mapsco map, a large, ring-bound book of a map well over 200 pages long--to find the best route. She traced the way down the tollway, find the best exit, highlighted it all in pencil, sent me on my way, map in the seat next to me.

And downtown is just as the map has it--Elm, Akard, Commerce St. I recognize the names and which should be where. The bird’s-eye view taking shape around every corner, at each stop light. Yes, yes this is right. I find the library on Young Street.

I’m working on an essay about Edna St. Vincent Millay. I thumb through the cards in the catalog. Millay, Edna St. Vincent---American Literature--Poetry--811.52 M645P 199-. I head to the third floor, find the 800’s, the 809’s, 810’s, 811’s. Then I scan for the .5’s, the .52’s, tap the books as I pass each one until finally, M645P. Right where it should be. Collected Poems.

Edna St. Vincent Millay

I read and read, found the poems so tight, the words cutting into each other. I take them home, type them out, slowly, each line, each word, each letter.

   

When I too long have looked upon your face

Why “too long have looked”? and not “looked too long”?

Looked upon your face

Looked upon? Looked...upon?

            mists of brightness

terrible beauty

a mind undone

familiar things grown strange

pause [comma!] and feel [ another comma!]and

hark

She is laying out the streets of her heart, the roads of her desire, the overgrown tangled path she traveled towards and then away from her lover.

I follow her, the poem a map. Turn here. Pass this. Here is the border, the edge. Trust me. Jump.