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Home  »  Poetry: A Magazine of Verse  »  Clifford Franklin Gessler

Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). The New Poetry: An Anthology. 1917.

Concentric Circles

Clifford Franklin Gessler

From “The Villager”

CRACKS in broken windows

Thread out like spokes from the center where a pebble or a bullet struck,

Cross and recross, and spread to the edge of the pane.

Ripples in still water or running water race out in concentric circles from the place where a stone or a body is thrown in.

Ice forms on pools in long thin slivers that knit slowly and close up the gaps till a hard, brittle floor is formed.

Fissures in stones spread slowly, and widen and deepen with the prying of frost.

Thoughts are like all these things.