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Photo of William Bronk

Bronk, William

William Bronk was an American poet. He won the National Book Award in 1982.. American poet

Email Poem - What We AreEmail Poem

What We Are

 What we are? We say we want to become
what we are or what we have an intent to be.
We read the possibilities, or try.
We get to some. We think we know how to read.
We recognize a word, here and there,
a syllable: male, it says perhaps,
or female, talent -- look what you could do 

or love, it says, love is what we mean.
Being at any cost: in the end, the cost
is terrible but so is the lure to us.
We see it move and shine and swallow it.
We say we are and this is what we are
as to say we should be and this is what to be 
and this is how. But, oh, it isn’t so.



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