In Blackwater Woods

 Look, the trees
are turning
their own bodies
into pillars

 

of light,
are giving off the rich
fragrance of cinnamon
and fulfillment,

 

the long tapers
of cattails
are bursting and floating away over
the blue shoulders

 

of the ponds,
and every pond,
no matter what its
name is, is

 

nameless now.
Every year
everything
I have ever learned

 

in my lifetime
leads back to this: the fires
and the black river of loss
whose other side

 

is salvation,
whose meaning
none of us will ever know.
To live in this world

 

you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it

 

against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go. 

I think this poem is about the authors adoptive family and her home in Ohio. When she talks about the fires and the black river of loss I think she may be talking about the tragedy that may have lead to her adoption. She keeps remembering it all the time and at the end she has to remind herself that in life when things are gone you have to let them go. Maybe she feels remorse because she didn't cherish her family when she had it. It just seems like in the beginning she is talking about heaven because it's the pillars of light like shining down from heaven and then she talks about the fragrance of cinnamon. I would assume heaven would smell good and I think cinnamon smells good. I think the fulfillment comes from the fact that maybe her parents are in heaven and they are safe and happy. I think the nameless ponds means that people lose their loved ones everyday and they are nameless to us but to the people who lost them it's a huge deal. I liked the way it went from just being pillars to pillars of light with the sweet fragrance. I typically don't like when the authors split up the sentences between stanzas but I don't mind it in this poem at all. I think it adds to the effect of the poem. Overall I really liked the poem a lot because it is partially about nature and it has a much deeper meaning than just how beautiful nature is.