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"Late Self-Portrait by Rembrandt"

By Jane HirshfieldPosted Tuesday, Oct. 26, 2004, at 9:03 AM ET

Listen to Jane Hirshfield reading this poem.

The dog, dead for years, keeps coming back in the dream.
We look at each other there with the old joy.
It was always her gift to bring me into the present—

Which sleeps, changes, awakens, dresses, leaves.

Happiness and unhappiness
differ as a bucket hammered from gold differs from one of pressed tin,
this painting proposes.

Each carries the same water, it says.

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Jane Hirshfield's sixth book of poetry, After, was named a "best book of 2006" by the Washington Post, the San Francisco Chronicle, and the Financial Times.

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