"Laurel becomes a devastated brow"

Eleanor Ross Taylor, who I guess is pushing 90, recently won the Ruth Lilly poetry prize. The current issue of Poetry has a bunch of her stuff, some of which is enjoyable. For instance,

And the happiness of  the unconscious
is scurrying already
from the knife-edge of   light,
pain’s night-light,
waiting under the door across the hall.

Dread’s square hair stiffens,
her feet have corners,
trying to trick the stairs out of their creaking,
and the house out of  groaning before coffee,
before resurrection.

Death before resurrection is hard;
breakfast and the stars belong first;
plenty of  time to die all day
when everything does groan, and unhappiness
shakes itself out like a musty old mare
all over the house.
(from "Pain in the House")

I also enjoyed "The Young Writer's Reply," "Kitchen Fable," and "Against the Kitchen Wall."