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Covalent Bonds

we are
dream carriers
child bearers
those burdens borne
with hope
and intensity
under the gravity
of responsibility
history and
love
not guilt
love
and hope
for those who
will dream
and share
these burdens born
we do not give up
willingly
but attract and repel
balance and share
stronger
in that bond of
love

Gwen Nell Westerman is the author of Follow the Blackbirds (Michigan State University Press, 2013), a poetry collection written in Dakota and English. The poet laureate of Minnesota, she is a professor at Minnesota State University, Mankato, and lives in rural Blue Earth County.

About Gwen Westerman

Themes

Mothers

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More by this poet

The 2022–2023 Laureate Fellows’ Collaborative Poem

^{Inspired by our 2021–22 cohort, sixteen regional poet laureate fellows from our 2022–23 cohort composed another exquisite corpse examining the role of a laureate in the community. Each laureate fellow received only what the poet before them had written and had to write a stanza responding to that. The starting questions were: What is a poet laureate? What does one do?}

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Gwen Westerman

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Undivided Interest

This is what is left of my land:

Gwen Westerman

2018

Dakota Homecoming

We are so honored that

you are here, they said.

We know that this is

your homeland, they said.

The admission price

is five dollars, they said.

Here is your button

for the event, they said.

Gwen Westerman

2018

Poems

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Covalent Bonds

More by this poet

The 2022–2023 Laureate Fellows’ Collaborative Poem

Undivided Interest

Dakota Homecoming

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