by Cristina Nehring (December 2025)
=
To write a verse (for us at least)
One must be in extremis.
=
Not for our kind the casual, clever line,
Not for us the erudite allusion.
=
Not for us the pound of flesh
Exacted by Shakespeare’s Shylock.
=
Not even that.
Suffering is the price of poems.
=
Suffering and longing.
My chest quakes;
=
My pen spills blood and ink.
Too high a price?
=
For sure.
But there’s no choice.
=
Art takes no hostages;
It releases no jailbirds.
=
–
Table of Contents
Cristina Nehring‘s most recent book is The Child Who Never Spoke: 23 1/2 Lessons in Fragility. She is also the author of A Vindication of Love which made the front page of the New York Times Book Review as well as two books in French. She writes for Atlantic, Harper’s, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. She lives in Paris with her daughter. See more at www.cristinanehring.net.
Follow NER on Twitter @NERIconoclast
