At the end of my ordeal there was a door. Listen to me: what you call death I remember. (from the poem "The Wild Iris") Parable and myth are present throughout the poetry of Louise Glück, a poetry that transcends the female experience, transforming it into a simple trace, a conceptual sign that remains to be explored, questioned, and interpreted. Especially in the collection The Wild Iris, the element of parable gives the garden – the imaginary space within which the voices of the poetic composition develop – a biblical and mythological hue. Within the gardener's garden (the poet's), a conversation takes place between three "voices": God or a higher being, the poet, and the plants and flowers. The gardener wonders about the finiteness of her existence, the decay of relationships with others, the leakage of meaning. She addresses her Creator, asking him in a way to reveal himself, through prayers (or anti-prayers), which Glück aptly titles "Matins" and "Vespers." God addresses his creations through poems that refer to a moment in the day ("Clear Morning"), or within the year ("April"), sometimes even to a meteorological condition ("Retreating Wind"). The voice of the plants and flowers, which appear in the composition with a frequency corresponding to their natural life cycle, functions contrapuntally to the conversation between Creator and gardener, creating an oratorio-like polyphony through which the perpetual repetition of birth, death, and rebirth – the unbroken cycle of life – is commented upon. With a writing that uses everyday language, which, however, is transcended through the subtle processing of the verse, the sudden cuts, the omissions, and the multiple biblical and mythological resonances at the core of the poems, Louise Glück vividly conveys the sharpness of her vision. An exceptional poetic composition for the time of blooming but also of withering, which masterfully captures the tragic beauty of life, in all its forms. Pulitzer Prize 1993 Nobel Prize in Literature 2020 - Bilingual Edition