Connor and Jack discuss Eavan Boland's poem "A Woman Without A Country" To read the poem, go here: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/detail/56177 For more on Eavan Boland, go here: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/eavan-boland A Woman Without A Country By: Eavan Boland As dawn breaks he enters A room with the odor of acid. He lays the copper plate on the table. And reaches for the shaft of the burin. Dublin wakes to horses and rain. Street hawkers call. All the news is famine and famine. The flat graver, the round graver, The angle tint tool wait for him. He bends to his work and begins. He starts with the head, cutting in To the line of the cheek, finding The slope of the skull, incising The shape of a face that becomes A foundry of shadows, rendering — With a deeper cut into copper — The whole woman as a skeleton, The rags of her skirt, her wrist In a bony line forever severing Her body from its native air until She is ready for the page, For the street vendor, for A new inventory which now To loss and to laissez-faire adds The odor of acid and the little, Pitiless tragedy of being imagined. He puts his tools away, One by one; lays them out carefully On the deal table, his work done. Find us on facebook at: facebook.com/closetalking Find us on twitter at: twitter.com/closetalking You can always send us an e-mail with thoughts on this or any of our previous podcasts, as well as suggestions for future shows, at [email protected].

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