Packed Carefully Away

A poem by Jane Greer (1953–2025)

The following piece by the poet Jane Greer, who passed away on July 22, appears in our Summer 2025 issue. We are honored to have published one of her final poems, and to know that the issue reached her and brought her joy. Order it here.

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It seemed an endless season of letting go,
and what was lost, surrendered, none will guess.
The tide will always smooth the battered beach
and the charred heart of the wood burst forth in green.

And all that was given up no one will know,
nor the cost which now seems nearly a caress:
all kept in secret, forming no part of speech.
Embers will cool and sands be made pristine.

All kept in secret, saved but pressed down low,
packed carefully away with a muttered blessing.
Tide cannot alter what it cannot reach.
The charred heart of the wood remains unseen.

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Jane Greer was the author of the poetry collections Love like a Conflagration (2020) and The World as We Know It Is Falling Away (2022), both from Lambing Press, and of Bathsheba on the Third Day (1986), from the Cummington Press. She lived in North Dakota.

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