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# Desire
- URL: https://poetry101.love/desire/
- Published: 2022-11-09T06:21:34.000Z
- Updated: 2022-11-09T06:21:34.000Z
- Description: by Alice Walker
- Author: Melissa Anderson
- Tags: Alice Walker, Hearts, #Import 2026-11-04 19:11

My desire  
is always the same; wherever Life  
deposits me:  
I want to stick my toe  
& soon my whole body  
into the water.  
I want to shake out a fat broom  
& sweep dried leaves  
bruised blossoms  
dead insects  
& dust.  
I want to grow  
something.  
It seems impossible that desire  
can sometimes transform into devotion;  
but this has happened.  
And that is how I've survived:  
how the hole  
I carefully tended  
in the garden of my heart  
grew a heart  
to fill it.

Walker, Alice. [The World Will Follow Joy: Turning Madness Into Flowers (New Poems)](https://www.google.com/books/edition/The%5FWorld%5FWill%5FFollow%5FJoy/zhGNAgAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0&kptab=getbook&ref=poetry101.love). United States, New Press, 2013.