Even So


︎︎︎ Joseph Porter

︎ Sept 17, 2026

Even so, one envies Miss Plath
her twenty-something figs—the young
woman’s unknowing embarrassment
of blithely possible coral dreams—
how if the tree were figless,
a gorgon’s swarm of dead bone?
How if the leering branches
were owl-taloned snakes?

Pity the modern woman
with too many figs.
Pity the man
with none.

















Joseph Porter is a professor at the University of Colorado Boulder.