"Origin of the Marble Forest" (A Poem)

Similar to Emily Dickinson’s “One need not be a Chamber to be Haunted” and Elizabeth Jennings’ “Ghosts,” Gregory Orr’s “Origin of the Marble Forest” uses the concept of ghosts in a metaphorical way. In this short, five-line poem, the narrator refuses to allow people associated with their past to slip away into faded memories. Rather, they want to preserve them, making them eternal and ever-present.

Childhood dotted with bodies.
Let them go, let them
be ghosts.
No, I said,
make them stay, make them stone.[1]

Works Referenced

Orr, Gregory. “Origin of the Marble Forest.” City of Salt. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1995. 3.
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[1] Orr, 3.