Women by Louise Bogan
Women have no wilderness in them, They are provident instead, Content in the tight hot cell of their hearts To eat dusty bread.
They do not see cattle cropping red winter grass, They do not hear Snow water going down under culverts Shallow and clear
They wait, when they should turn to journeys, They stiffen, when they should bend. They use against themselves that benevolence To which no man is friend.
They cannot think of so many crops to a field Or of clean wood cleft by an axe. Their love is an eager meaninglessness Too tense or too lax.
They hear in any whisper that speaks to them A shout and a cry. As like as not, when they take life over their door-sill They should let it go by.