PoemPickle Belt
Author / PoetTheodore Roethke
TagsDust, Saturday

The fruit rolled by all day.
They prayed the cogs would creep;
They thought about Saturday pay,
And Sunday sleep.

Whatever he smelled was good:
The fruit and flesh smells mixed.
There beside him she stood,—
And he, perplexed;

He, in his shrunken britches,
Eyes rimmed with pickle dust,
Prickling with all the itches
Of sixteen-year-old lust.

Theodore Roethke
Theodore Roethke
25 May 1908 - 1 Aug 1963
Region: North America
Period: Modernist
Movement: Confessional, Romanticism
Awards: National Book Award, Pulitzer Prize for Poetry

more poems by Theodore Roethke

Poem NameTopic
The Waking (1948)Field, Happy, Stream
Selections From I Am! Said The LambBlizzard, Ceiling, Chair
The PikeEye, Pool, Shadow
The Saginaw SongGlass, Plate, Stream
The VisitantCloud, Mountain, Stone
Root CellarBreath, Dark, Root
Big WindMorning, Rose, Storm
The Shape Of The FireFire, Flower, House
The VoiceBird, Heart, Tree
Journey into the InteriorInterior, Journey, Rain

all poems by Theodore Roethke

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