Midweek Poem 9: The Ache of Marriage

I once was blessed to hear Denise Levertov read this poem and others in Tulsa as a student at TU....

The Ache of Marriage

The ache of marriage:

thigh and tongue, beloved,   

are heavy with it,   

it throbs in the teeth

We look for communion

and are turned away, beloved,   

each and each

It is leviathan and we   

in its belly

looking for joy, some joy   

not to be known outside it

two by two in the ark of   

the ache of it.

--------Denise Levertov, 1966