“Next to nothing,” by Beverley Bie Brahic (Poetry ’06)

2006 poetry graduate Beverley Bie Brahic was recently featured on the Scottish Poetry Library Podcast and had a poem featured in The New Criterion. Read an excerpt of “Next to nothing” below:

Next to nothing

Ambling back from the bottle dump
I glimpse my neighbor, busy
Under a honeysuckle’s winter thatch.
Summer in February, we agree—
But should we rejoice or be scared?
She’s picking the grey-green leaves
From a sheaf of dried verbena,
Replenishing her tin of bedtime teas:
Verbena leaves that weigh next to nothing.

Read the poem in its entirety here: https://newcriterion.com/issues/2020/10/next-to-nothing