Marilyn Hacker: Winter Numbers

“Lovely and unremarkable, the clutter
of mugs and books, the almost-empty Fig
Newtons box, thick dishes in a big
tin tray, the knife still standing in the butter,
change like the color of river water
in the delicate shift to day. Thin fog
veils the hedges, where a neighbor dog
makes rounds. 'Go to bed. It doesn't matter
about the washing-up. Take this book along.'
Whatever it was we said that night is gone,
framed like a photograph nobody took.
Stretched out on a camp cot with the book,
I think that we will talk all night again,
there, or another where, but I am wrong.”


Marilyn Hacker's Winter Number discusses things that seem to dissapear in a persons life. The line that says "Thin fog veils the hedges, where a neighbor dog makes rounds" shows a similarity between one another. It says that a dog could stay up for a long period of time and so does thin fog that veils the hedges.