In the introduction to her Selected Poems, former Poet Laureate Rita Dove posed the following “ultimate—and ultimately unanswerable—questions” regarding the “mystery of what destiny boils down to”:
- How does where I come from determine where I’ve ended up?
- Why am I what I am and not what I thought I’d be?
- What did I think I’d be?
- Where do I reside most completely?
It is at this stage of life that I have time to search for answers to these heretofore unanswerable questions and to begin the task of solving the mystery of my own destiny. I invite you to take the journey with me.
Gwen Dungy 