David Barber is poetry editor of The Atlantic, where he has been a staff editor since 1994. Barber has taught writing and literature at Middlebury College, the Harvard Writing Program, MIT’s Program in Writing and Humanistic Studies, and the Emerson College graduate writing program. He also writes on natural history, music, and art.
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By David Barber
Here is where
You can get nowhere
Faster than ever
As you go under
Deeper and deeper
In the fertile smother
Of another acre
Like any other
You can’t peer over
And then another
And everywhere
You veer or hare
There you are
Farther and farther
Afield than before
But on you blunder
In...
By David Barber
What if   it were possible to vanquish
All this shame with a wash of   varnish
Instead of wishing the stain would vanish?
What if   you gave it a glossy finish?
What if   there were a way to burnish
All this foolishness, all the anguish?
What if...
