Closer to dawn, at almost four
with the wind more
from the west, she
will try to sleep
one more time, imagining the
ground dove’s quiet cry,
always grateful
that daylight’s dull
Phebe Davidson, who lived the first forty-some years of her life in New Jersey, has been a resident of South Carolina since 1991, when she joined the faculty of the University of South Carolina Aiken where she taught an array of film, literature, and writing courses. She began writing poetry in 1985 (when she was already too old to be a Yale Younger Poet). She is the author of several collections of poems, most recently Twelve Leagues In (Spire Press), The Drowned Man (Finishing Line Press), and Song Dog (South Carolina Poetry Initiative) as well as a handful of books on American Film and American Literature. In her second full year of retirement from what feels like several lifetimes of teaching and writing in a university setting, she is convinced that retirement is a nearly ecstatic circumstance for any sane person. She is the founding editor of Palanquin Press and a staff writer for The Asheville Poetry Review.