By Daniel Brenner
There isn’t enough soy sauce in the world to feed
Jews on Christmas
Huddled around steaming plates of dumplings
Discussing cinematography
Angioplasty
Lactaid
Who has lived and who has died
Shocked to hear that the hot new Hollywood star is actually half-Jewish
(and not arguing which half)
I don’t see what all the fuss is about Nathan Englander.
Yes, it’s like The Wire, but different,
Costco is a mixed blessing,
Do you trust Yelp?
On our smartphones we subtract the Chinese year from the Jewish year to see how long the Jews had to wait to try egg drop soup.
The laughter of Jews on Christmas
shakes the jade Buddha under the faux waterfall from his
sleepy serenity
And for a moment, the enlightened one opens his eyes,
smiling contently as he joins us to look at pictures of relatives at Harry Potter world.
Now he’s Jewish too.
The Moo Shu comes with little tortillas, pancakes, wraps,
whatever you want to call them.
And we wrap up the mush of last year, with all of its regrets and tzuris,
And immerse into soy sauce,
a ritual bath,
three times dipped,
and we say – this is not bad.
Our highest compliment.
Wednesday, October 26, 2016
Destruction Bay, Yukon
By Cinthia Ritchie
Fog fills the water,
it’s hard to see the mountains,
we’ve been camped here for days,
like my own skin, ordinary, warm,
the surprise of no surprises,
<>we swim through nights without
darkness, wake to
mouths, meanings,
bear prints around the tent,
we hang our food from tree branches,
drink dirty water,
sit on the shore until we lose
our capacity for words,
the waves,
the long cool stretches,
and wild.
Cinthia Ritchie writes and runs mountains in Anchorage, Alaska. Find her work at Evening Street Review, Sport Literate, Best American Sports Writing 2013, Cactus Heart Press, Water-Stone Review, damfino, Mary, The Boiler Journal, damselfly press, Foliate Oak Literary Magazine and others. Her first novel, "Dolls Behaving Badly," released from Grand Central Publishing/Hachette Book Group.
Fog fills the water,
it’s hard to see the mountains,
we’ve been camped here for days,
the surprise of no surprises,
<>we swim through nights without
darkness, wake to
mouths, meanings,
bear prints around the tent,
we hang our food from tree branches,
drink dirty water,
sit on the shore until we lose
our capacity for words,
the waves,
the long cool stretches,
and wild.
Cinthia Ritchie writes and runs mountains in Anchorage, Alaska. Find her work at Evening Street Review, Sport Literate, Best American Sports Writing 2013, Cactus Heart Press, Water-Stone Review, damfino, Mary, The Boiler Journal, damselfly press, Foliate Oak Literary Magazine and others. Her first novel, "Dolls Behaving Badly," released from Grand Central Publishing/Hachette Book Group.
Tuesday, October 25, 2016
After the Dragonflies
By W.S. Merwin
Dragonflies were as common as sunlight
hovering in their own days
backward forward and sideways
as though they were memory
now there are grown-ups hurrying
who never saw one
and do not know what they
are not seeing
the veins in a dragonfly’s wings
were made of light
the veins in the leaves knew them
and the flowing rivers
the dragonflies came out of the color of water
knowing their own way
when we appeared in their eyes
we were strangers
they took their light with them when they went
there will be no one to remember us
Dragonflies were as common as sunlight
hovering in their own days
backward forward and sideways
as though they were memory
now there are grown-ups hurrying
who never saw one
and do not know what they
are not seeing
the veins in a dragonfly’s wings
were made of light
the veins in the leaves knew them
and the flowing rivers
the dragonflies came out of the color of water
knowing their own way
when we appeared in their eyes
we were strangers
they took their light with them when they went
there will be no one to remember us
Thursday, October 20, 2016
Trying to talk with a man
By Adrienne Rich
Out in this desert we are testing bombs,
that's why we came here.
Sometimes I feel an underground river
forcing its way between deformed cliffs
an acute angle of understanding
moving itself like a locus of the sun
into this condemned scenery.
What we’ve had to give up to get here –
whole LP collections, films we starred in
playing in the neighborhoods, bakery windows
full of dry, chocolate-filled Jewish cookies,
the language of love-letters, of suicide notes,
afternoons on the riverbank
pretending to be children
Coming out to this desert
we meant to change the face of
driving among dull green succulents
walking at noon in the ghost town
surrounded by a silence
that sounds like the silence of the place
except that it came with us
and is familiar
and everything we were saying until now
was an effort to blot it out –
coming out here we are up against it
Out here I feel more helpless
with you than without you
You mention the danger
and list the equipment
we talk of people caring for each other
in emergencies - laceration, thirst -
but you look at me like an emergency
Your dry heat feels like power
your eyes are stars of a different magnitude
they reflect lights that spell out: EXIT
when you get up and pace the floor
talking of the danger
as if it were not ourselves
as if we were testing anything else.
Out in this desert we are testing bombs,
that's why we came here.
Sometimes I feel an underground river
forcing its way between deformed cliffs
an acute angle of understanding
moving itself like a locus of the sun
into this condemned scenery.
What we’ve had to give up to get here –
whole LP collections, films we starred in
playing in the neighborhoods, bakery windows
full of dry, chocolate-filled Jewish cookies,
the language of love-letters, of suicide notes,
afternoons on the riverbank
pretending to be children
Coming out to this desert
we meant to change the face of
driving among dull green succulents
walking at noon in the ghost town
surrounded by a silence
that sounds like the silence of the place
except that it came with us
and is familiar
and everything we were saying until now
was an effort to blot it out –
coming out here we are up against it
Out here I feel more helpless
with you than without you
You mention the danger
and list the equipment
we talk of people caring for each other
in emergencies - laceration, thirst -
but you look at me like an emergency
Your dry heat feels like power
your eyes are stars of a different magnitude
they reflect lights that spell out: EXIT
when you get up and pace the floor
talking of the danger
as if it were not ourselves
as if we were testing anything else.
Tuesday, October 18, 2016
Like You
By Roque Dalton
Like you I
love love, life, the sweet smell
of things, the sky-blue
landscape of January days.
And my blood boils up
and I laugh through eyes
that have known the buds of tears.
I believe the world is beautiful
and that poetry, like bread, is for everyone.
And that my veins don't end in me
but in the unanimous blood
of those who struggle for life,
love,
little things,
landscape and bread,
the poetry of everyone.
Translated by Jack Hirschman
Como tu
Yo, como tu,
amo el amor, la vida, el dulce encanto
de las cosas, el paisaje
celeste de los dias de enero.
Tambien mi sangre bulle
y rio por los ojos
que han conocido el brote de las lagrimas.
Creo que el mundo es bello,
que la poesia es como el pan, de todos.
Y que mis venas no terminan en mi
sino en la sangre unanime
de lose que luchan por la vida,
el amor,
las cosas,
el paisaje y el pan,
las poesia de todos.
Like you I
love love, life, the sweet smell
of things, the sky-blue
landscape of January days.
And my blood boils up
and I laugh through eyes
that have known the buds of tears.
I believe the world is beautiful
and that poetry, like bread, is for everyone.
And that my veins don't end in me
but in the unanimous blood
of those who struggle for life,
love,
little things,
landscape and bread,
the poetry of everyone.
Translated by Jack Hirschman
Como tu
Yo, como tu,
amo el amor, la vida, el dulce encanto
de las cosas, el paisaje
celeste de los dias de enero.
Tambien mi sangre bulle
y rio por los ojos
que han conocido el brote de las lagrimas.
Creo que el mundo es bello,
que la poesia es como el pan, de todos.
Y que mis venas no terminan en mi
sino en la sangre unanime
de lose que luchan por la vida,
el amor,
las cosas,
el paisaje y el pan,
las poesia de todos.
Monday, October 17, 2016
I Explain A Few Things
By Pablo Neruda
You will ask: But where are the lilacs?
And the metaphysics covered with poppies?
And the rain that often struck
his words, filling them
with holes and birds?
I am going to tell you what’s happening to me.
I lived in a barrio
of Madrid, with bells,
with clocks, with trees.
From there you could see
the parched face of Castile
like an ocean of leather.
My house was called
the house of flowers, because from everywhere
geraniums burst: it was
a beautiful house,
with dogs and children.
Raul, do you remember?
Do you remember, Rafael?
Federico, do you remember
under the ground,
do you remember my house with balconies
where the June light drowned the flowers in your mouth?
Brother, brother!
Everything
was loud voices, salt of goods,
crowds of pulsating bread,
marketplaces in my barrio of Arguelles with its statue
like a pale inkwell set down among the hake:
oil flowed into spoons,
a deep throbbing
of feet and hands filled the streets,
meters, liters, the hard
edges of life,
heaps of fish,
geometry of roofs under a cold sun in which
the weathervane grew tired,
delirious fine ivory of potatoes,
tomatoes, more tomatoes, all the way to the sea.
And one morning all was burning
and one morning bonfires
sprang out of the earth
devouring humans,
and from then on fire,
gunpowder from then on,
and from then on blood.
Bandidos with planes and Moors,
bandidos with rings and duchesses,
bandidos with black friars signing the cross
coming down from the sky to kill children,
and in the streets the blood of the children
ran simply, like children’s blood.
Jackals the jackal would despise,
stones the dry thistle would bite on and spit out,
vipers the vipers would abominate.
Facing you I have seen the blood
of Spain rise up
to drown you in a single wave
of pride and knives.
Treacherous,
generals:
look at my dead house,
look at Spain broken:
from every house burning metal comes out
instead of flowers,
but from every crater of Spain
comes Spain
from every dead child comes a rifle with eyes,
from every crime bullets are born
that will one day will find out in you
the site of the heart.
You will ask: why doesn’t his poetry
Speak to us of dreams, of leaves
of the great volcanoes of his native land?
Come and see the blood in the streets,
come and see
the blood in the streets,
come and see the blood
in the streets!
Translated by Galway Kinnell
* Line breaks are not how they originally appear
You will ask: But where are the lilacs?
And the metaphysics covered with poppies?
And the rain that often struck
his words, filling them
with holes and birds?
I am going to tell you what’s happening to me.
I lived in a barrio
of Madrid, with bells,
with clocks, with trees.
From there you could see
the parched face of Castile
like an ocean of leather.
My house was called
the house of flowers, because from everywhere
geraniums burst: it was
a beautiful house,
with dogs and children.
Raul, do you remember?
Do you remember, Rafael?
Federico, do you remember
under the ground,
do you remember my house with balconies
where the June light drowned the flowers in your mouth?
Brother, brother!
Everything
was loud voices, salt of goods,
crowds of pulsating bread,
marketplaces in my barrio of Arguelles with its statue
like a pale inkwell set down among the hake:
oil flowed into spoons,
a deep throbbing
of feet and hands filled the streets,
meters, liters, the hard
edges of life,
heaps of fish,
geometry of roofs under a cold sun in which
the weathervane grew tired,
delirious fine ivory of potatoes,
tomatoes, more tomatoes, all the way to the sea.
And one morning all was burning
and one morning bonfires
sprang out of the earth
devouring humans,
and from then on fire,
gunpowder from then on,
and from then on blood.
Bandidos with planes and Moors,
bandidos with rings and duchesses,
bandidos with black friars signing the cross
coming down from the sky to kill children,
and in the streets the blood of the children
ran simply, like children’s blood.
Jackals the jackal would despise,
stones the dry thistle would bite on and spit out,
vipers the vipers would abominate.
Facing you I have seen the blood
of Spain rise up
to drown you in a single wave
of pride and knives.
Treacherous,
generals:
look at my dead house,
look at Spain broken:
from every house burning metal comes out
instead of flowers,
but from every crater of Spain
comes Spain
from every dead child comes a rifle with eyes,
from every crime bullets are born
that will one day will find out in you
the site of the heart.
You will ask: why doesn’t his poetry
Speak to us of dreams, of leaves
of the great volcanoes of his native land?
Come and see the blood in the streets,
come and see
the blood in the streets,
come and see the blood
in the streets!
Translated by Galway Kinnell
* Line breaks are not how they originally appear
Thursday, October 13, 2016
Man in the Long Black Coat
By Bob Dylan
Crickets are chirpin' the water is high
There's a soft cotton dress on the line hangin' dry
Window wide open African trees
Bent over backwards from a hurricane breeze
Not a word of goodbye not even a note
She gone with the man in the long black coat.
Somebody seen him hangin' around
As the old dance hall on the outskirts of town
He looked into her eyes when she stopped him to ask
If he wanted to dance he had a face like a mask
Somebody said from the Bible he'd quote
There was dust on the man in the long black coat.
Preacher was talking there's a sermon he gave
He said every man's conscience is vile and depraved
You cannot depend on it to be your guide
When it's you who must keep it satisfied
It ain't easy to swallow it sticks in the throat
She gave her heart to the man in the long black coat.
There are no mistakes in life some people say
It is true sometimes you can see it that way
But people don't live or die people just float
She went with the man in the long black coat.
There's smoke on the water it's been there since June
Tree trunks uprooted beneath the high crescent moon
Feel the pulse and vibration and the rumbling force
Somebody is out there beating on a dead horse
She never said nothing there was nothing she wrote
She gone with the man in the long black coat.
Crickets are chirpin' the water is high
There's a soft cotton dress on the line hangin' dry
Window wide open African trees
Bent over backwards from a hurricane breeze
Not a word of goodbye not even a note
She gone with the man in the long black coat.
Somebody seen him hangin' around
As the old dance hall on the outskirts of town
He looked into her eyes when she stopped him to ask
If he wanted to dance he had a face like a mask
Somebody said from the Bible he'd quote
There was dust on the man in the long black coat.
Preacher was talking there's a sermon he gave
He said every man's conscience is vile and depraved
You cannot depend on it to be your guide
When it's you who must keep it satisfied
It ain't easy to swallow it sticks in the throat
She gave her heart to the man in the long black coat.
There are no mistakes in life some people say
It is true sometimes you can see it that way
But people don't live or die people just float
She went with the man in the long black coat.
There's smoke on the water it's been there since June
Tree trunks uprooted beneath the high crescent moon
Feel the pulse and vibration and the rumbling force
Somebody is out there beating on a dead horse
She never said nothing there was nothing she wrote
She gone with the man in the long black coat.
Monday, October 10, 2016
Father
By Georgeann Eskievich Rettberg
Hell, steelworkers built this country.
I work like a jackass in there.
I deserve the money.
They take half in taxes,
but shit, this ia a great country.
Can't complain even with strikes layoffs.
I got a house a car a kid in college.
But the shit that goes on in the place.
The noise blows your head off.
And hot try sitting in a tree
in the middle of a forest fire.
Dying doesn't scare me.
Christ, I've seen hell.
It has smokestacks and a blast furnace.
Hell, steelworkers built this country.
I work like a jackass in there.
I deserve the money.
They take half in taxes,
but shit, this ia a great country.
Can't complain even with strikes layoffs.
I got a house a car a kid in college.
But the shit that goes on in the place.
The noise blows your head off.
And hot try sitting in a tree
in the middle of a forest fire.
Dying doesn't scare me.
Christ, I've seen hell.
It has smokestacks and a blast furnace.
Wednesday, October 5, 2016
The Head of the Year
By Marge Piercy
The moon is dark tonight, a new
moon for a new year. It is
hollow and hungers to be full.
It is the black zero of beginning.
Now you must void yourself
of injuries, insults, incursions.
Go with empty hands to those
you have hurt and make amends.
It is not too late. It is early
and about to grow. Now
is the time to do what you
know you must and have feared
to begin. Your face is dark
too as you turn inward to face
yourself, the hidden twin of
all you must grow to be.
Forgive the dead year. Forgive
yourself. What will be wants
to push through your fingers.
The light you seek hides
in your belly. The light you
crave longs to stream from
your eyes. You are the moon
that will wax in new goodness.
The moon is dark tonight, a new
moon for a new year. It is
hollow and hungers to be full.
It is the black zero of beginning.
Now you must void yourself
of injuries, insults, incursions.
Go with empty hands to those
you have hurt and make amends.
It is not too late. It is early
and about to grow. Now
is the time to do what you
know you must and have feared
to begin. Your face is dark
too as you turn inward to face
yourself, the hidden twin of
all you must grow to be.
Forgive the dead year. Forgive
yourself. What will be wants
to push through your fingers.
The light you seek hides
in your belly. The light you
crave longs to stream from
your eyes. You are the moon
that will wax in new goodness.
Sunday, October 2, 2016
Birthday of the World: A Psalm for Rosh Hashanah
By Marcia Falk
Today is the birthday of the world.
But the world knows nothing
of this invention.
The world just keeps moving about itself,
buzzing and humming, exulting and keening,
birthing and being born,
while the mind keeps on its own way—
form-craving, metaphor-making,
over and over, giving birth and being born.
Today is the birthday of the world.
But the world knows nothing
of this invention.
The world just keeps moving about itself,
buzzing and humming, exulting and keening,
birthing and being born,
while the mind keeps on its own way—
form-craving, metaphor-making,
over and over, giving birth and being born.
Friday, September 30, 2016
Powerhouse
By Nick Norwood, Michael McFalls, Marc Olivié and Marleen De Bode Olivié
now that you are here
amid crag and gleam
mist-rise and vapor
dark jade frothing
into white lace
here where the rains
come to gargle
spit jets of spray
see herons creep
smokestacks peer
through high windows
spirits sleep
spool and spindle
shaft and shackle
tie-snake and eagle
sit still
as an old powerhouse
and mind your moorings
the river roaring.
This poem is part of a public art display on the Chattahoochee RiverWalk
now that you are here
amid crag and gleam
mist-rise and vapor
dark jade frothing
into white lace
here where the rains
come to gargle
spit jets of spray
see herons creep
smokestacks peer
through high windows
spirits sleep
spool and spindle
shaft and shackle
tie-snake and eagle
sit still
as an old powerhouse
and mind your moorings
the river roaring.
This poem is part of a public art display on the Chattahoochee RiverWalk
Sunday, September 25, 2016
I, too, sing America
By Langston Hughes
I, too, sing America.
I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.
Tomorrow,
I’ll be at the table
When company comes.
Nobody’ll dare
Say to me,
“Eat in the kitchen,"
Then.
Besides,
They’ll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed—
I, too, am America.
I, too, sing America.
I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.
Tomorrow,
I’ll be at the table
When company comes.
Nobody’ll dare
Say to me,
“Eat in the kitchen,"
Then.
Besides,
They’ll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed—
I, too, am America.
Friday, September 16, 2016
Untitled
By Serena Williams
She turns her disappointment into triumph.
Her grief into joy. Her rejections into approvals.
If no one believes in her it does not matter. She believes in herself.
Nothing stops her. No one can touch her.
She is woman.
She turns her disappointment into triumph.
Her grief into joy. Her rejections into approvals.
If no one believes in her it does not matter. She believes in herself.
Nothing stops her. No one can touch her.
She is woman.
Monday, September 12, 2016
It's My Body
By Denise Duhamel
“There was a time when Barbie couldn’t even
bend her knees,” I told my nieces Kerri and Katie
who sit before me on a living room floor
in blue and pink collar America.
They are strapping their Rock-n-Roll Barbies
into tiny leatherette pants
and big black guitars
with jagged lightning hips. Katie hands me
her doll because she needs help
with the tiny buttons that snake the back
of Barbie’s off-the-shoulder blouse. “My first Barbie
couldn´t even twist her waist”. I am talking
like a person who has lived long enough
to see significant change. My nieces
have their backs to the TV which seems always on,
wherever I am. And behind their blond
innocent heads, Jessica Hahn
makes a cameo appearance on an MTV video.
She rolls like a sexy pinball,
then tries to claw herself out of a concave cage.
“It’s my body”, I recently heard her say
on a morning talk show. She started
by defending her nude poses in Playboy.
“It’s my body”, she repeated
like a Chatty Cathy doll
with a skipping record stuck in her back.
“It’s my body,” she began to answer
her interviewer’s every inquiry –
where she grew up, if she still went to church.
“It’s my body?”
The words stayed the same,
but as more accusations came, her inflections
changed. Jessica looked beyond the studio set
where somebody seemed to be cueing her
that message. My lover was laughing.
“How about a little conviction there, Jessica?”,
he said to the TV. Then, trying to coax
more conversation, he addressed me, “Look,
honey, she doesn’t even seem to know if it’s her body
or not.” He was right,
but he knew as he brought it up,
it was the wrong thing to say.
I’d had too much coffee.
I found myself energetically defending Jessica,
blaming her disorientation
as a response to our misogynous society-
the dislocation all women feel
from their physical selves.
And then came the theories I’d been reading.
He left for work kind of agreeing
but also complaining that I’d made him exhausted.
And now my sister is blaming me for the same thing
because I am pointing out to Katie that she is mistaken
to think only boys should get dirty
and only girls should wear earrings.
“People should be able to do whatever they want.”
I lecture her about my friend who wears a hard hat
when she goes to her job and works
with electricity, just like her daddy.
Katie fiddles with her shoelaces
and asks for juice. My sister says,
“Give the kid a break. She’s only in kindergarten.”
Older Kerri is concentrating, trying
to get a big comb for humans
through her doll’s Moussed synthetic hair.
Because untangling the snarls needs so much force,
suddenly, accidentally, Barbie’s head pops off,
and a smaller one, a faceless socket,
emerges from her neck. For an instant
we all –two sets of sisters, our ages
twenty years apart – share a small epiphany
about Mattel: this brainwashed piece of plastic cerebrum
is underneath who Barbie is. But soon
Kerri’s face is all panic, like she will be punished.
The tears begin in the corner of her eyes.
I make a fast rescue attempt,
spearing Barbie’s molded head
back on her body, her malleable features distorting
under my thumb. Although a grown doll,
the soft spot at the top of her skull
still hasn’t closed. Under the pressure
of my touch, her face is squashed, someone
posing in a fun house mirror.
But the instant I let go, she snaps back
into a polite smile, her perfect nose
erect and ready to make everything
right: Barbie is America’s –
half victim, half little pink soldier.
“There was a time when Barbie couldn’t even
bend her knees,” I told my nieces Kerri and Katie
who sit before me on a living room floor
in blue and pink collar America.
They are strapping their Rock-n-Roll Barbies
into tiny leatherette pants
and big black guitars
with jagged lightning hips. Katie hands me
her doll because she needs help
with the tiny buttons that snake the back
of Barbie’s off-the-shoulder blouse. “My first Barbie
couldn´t even twist her waist”. I am talking
like a person who has lived long enough
to see significant change. My nieces
have their backs to the TV which seems always on,
wherever I am. And behind their blond
innocent heads, Jessica Hahn
makes a cameo appearance on an MTV video.
She rolls like a sexy pinball,
then tries to claw herself out of a concave cage.
“It’s my body”, I recently heard her say
on a morning talk show. She started
by defending her nude poses in Playboy.
“It’s my body”, she repeated
like a Chatty Cathy doll
with a skipping record stuck in her back.
“It’s my body,” she began to answer
her interviewer’s every inquiry –
where she grew up, if she still went to church.
“It’s my body?”
The words stayed the same,
but as more accusations came, her inflections
changed. Jessica looked beyond the studio set
where somebody seemed to be cueing her
that message. My lover was laughing.
“How about a little conviction there, Jessica?”,
he said to the TV. Then, trying to coax
more conversation, he addressed me, “Look,
honey, she doesn’t even seem to know if it’s her body
or not.” He was right,
but he knew as he brought it up,
it was the wrong thing to say.
I’d had too much coffee.
I found myself energetically defending Jessica,
blaming her disorientation
as a response to our misogynous society-
the dislocation all women feel
from their physical selves.
And then came the theories I’d been reading.
He left for work kind of agreeing
but also complaining that I’d made him exhausted.
And now my sister is blaming me for the same thing
because I am pointing out to Katie that she is mistaken
to think only boys should get dirty
and only girls should wear earrings.
“People should be able to do whatever they want.”
I lecture her about my friend who wears a hard hat
when she goes to her job and works
with electricity, just like her daddy.
Katie fiddles with her shoelaces
and asks for juice. My sister says,
“Give the kid a break. She’s only in kindergarten.”
Older Kerri is concentrating, trying
to get a big comb for humans
through her doll’s Moussed synthetic hair.
Because untangling the snarls needs so much force,
suddenly, accidentally, Barbie’s head pops off,
and a smaller one, a faceless socket,
emerges from her neck. For an instant
we all –two sets of sisters, our ages
twenty years apart – share a small epiphany
about Mattel: this brainwashed piece of plastic cerebrum
is underneath who Barbie is. But soon
Kerri’s face is all panic, like she will be punished.
The tears begin in the corner of her eyes.
I make a fast rescue attempt,
spearing Barbie’s molded head
back on her body, her malleable features distorting
under my thumb. Although a grown doll,
the soft spot at the top of her skull
still hasn’t closed. Under the pressure
of my touch, her face is squashed, someone
posing in a fun house mirror.
But the instant I let go, she snaps back
into a polite smile, her perfect nose
erect and ready to make everything
right: Barbie is America’s –
half victim, half little pink soldier.
Thursday, September 1, 2016
September 1, 1939
By W. H. Auden
I sit in one of the dives
On Fifty-second Street
Uncertain and afraid
As the clever hopes expire
Of a low dishonest decade:
Waves of anger and fear
Circulate over the bright
And darkened lands of the earth,
Obsessing our private lives;
The unmentionable odour of death
Offends the September night.
Accurate scholarship can
Unearth the whole offence
From Luther until now
That has driven a culture mad,
Find what occurred at Linz,
What huge imago made
A psychopathic god:
I and the public know
What all schoolchildren learn,
Those to whom evil is done
Do evil in return.
Exiled Thucydides knew
All that a speech can say
About Democracy,
And what dictators do,
The elderly rubbish they talk
To an apathetic grave;
Analysed all in his book,
The enlightenment driven away,
The habit-forming pain,
Mismanagement and grief:
We must suffer them all again.
Into this neutral air
Where blind skyscrapers use
Their full height to proclaim
The strength of Collective Man,
Each language pours its vain
Competitive excuse:
But who can live for long
In an euphoric dream;
Out of the mirror they stare,
Imperialism's face
And the international wrong.
Faces along the bar
Cling to their average day:
The lights must never go out,
The music must always play,
All the conventions conspire
To make this fort assume
The furniture of home;
Lest we should see where we are,
Lost in a haunted wood,
Children afraid of the night
Who have never been happy or good.
The windiest militant trash
Important Persons shout
Is not so crude as our wish:
What mad Nijinsky wrote
About Diaghilev
Is true of the normal heart;
For the error bred in the bone
Of each woman and each man
Craves what it cannot have,
Not universal love
But to be loved alone.
From the conservative dark
Into the ethical life
The dense commuters come,
Repeating their morning vow;
"I will be true to the wife,
I'll concentrate more on my work,"
And helpless governors wake
To resume their compulsory game:
Who can release them now,
Who can reach the deaf,
Who can speak for the dumb?
All I have is a voice
To undo the folded lie,
The romantic lie in the brain
Of the sensual man-in-the-street
And the lie of Authority
Whose buildings grope the sky:
There is no such thing as the State
And no one exists alone;
Hunger allows no choice
To the citizen or the police;
We must love one another or die.
Defenceless under the night
Our world in stupor lies;
Yet, dotted everywhere,
Ironic points of light
Flash out wherever the Just
Exchange their messages:
May I, composed like them
Of Eros and of dust,
Beleaguered by the same
Negation and despair,
Show an affirming flame.
I sit in one of the dives
On Fifty-second Street
Uncertain and afraid
As the clever hopes expire
Of a low dishonest decade:
Waves of anger and fear
Circulate over the bright
And darkened lands of the earth,
Obsessing our private lives;
The unmentionable odour of death
Offends the September night.
Accurate scholarship can
Unearth the whole offence
From Luther until now
That has driven a culture mad,
Find what occurred at Linz,
What huge imago made
A psychopathic god:
I and the public know
What all schoolchildren learn,
Those to whom evil is done
Do evil in return.
Exiled Thucydides knew
All that a speech can say
About Democracy,
And what dictators do,
The elderly rubbish they talk
To an apathetic grave;
Analysed all in his book,
The enlightenment driven away,
The habit-forming pain,
Mismanagement and grief:
We must suffer them all again.
Into this neutral air
Where blind skyscrapers use
Their full height to proclaim
The strength of Collective Man,
Each language pours its vain
Competitive excuse:
But who can live for long
In an euphoric dream;
Out of the mirror they stare,
Imperialism's face
And the international wrong.
Faces along the bar
Cling to their average day:
The lights must never go out,
The music must always play,
All the conventions conspire
To make this fort assume
The furniture of home;
Lest we should see where we are,
Lost in a haunted wood,
Children afraid of the night
Who have never been happy or good.
The windiest militant trash
Important Persons shout
Is not so crude as our wish:
What mad Nijinsky wrote
About Diaghilev
Is true of the normal heart;
For the error bred in the bone
Of each woman and each man
Craves what it cannot have,
Not universal love
But to be loved alone.
From the conservative dark
Into the ethical life
The dense commuters come,
Repeating their morning vow;
"I will be true to the wife,
I'll concentrate more on my work,"
And helpless governors wake
To resume their compulsory game:
Who can release them now,
Who can reach the deaf,
Who can speak for the dumb?
All I have is a voice
To undo the folded lie,
The romantic lie in the brain
Of the sensual man-in-the-street
And the lie of Authority
Whose buildings grope the sky:
There is no such thing as the State
And no one exists alone;
Hunger allows no choice
To the citizen or the police;
We must love one another or die.
Defenceless under the night
Our world in stupor lies;
Yet, dotted everywhere,
Ironic points of light
Flash out wherever the Just
Exchange their messages:
May I, composed like them
Of Eros and of dust,
Beleaguered by the same
Negation and despair,
Show an affirming flame.
Wednesday, August 31, 2016
To The Black and Brown Girls Who Go Missing Before They Go Missing
By Elisabet Velasquez
Maybe it was because of the last time
you ran away with the boy
who looked like God.
Maybe it was because of the way
you came back three days later
like you were God.
Maybe they expected you
to resurrect like this, again,
like you have always been a dead girl,
wanting to rise,
glory and miracle.
Like you just wanted your loved ones
to gather around you
so you made a funeral of your body.
Maybe they did not search for you
because you being gone
was not enough evidence
that you were indeed missing.
You so loud, the police are sure
your family will find you.
Crying wolf. Crying rape. Crying.
You so loud
that when you are silent,
they point your parents in the direction
of your echo and say look,
a cave in love with her own darkness.
When the media does not report the news
of your disappearance, you are not a girl worthy of a torch.
You, girl with bonfire hair, do not get to be illuminated.
Do not get to smile for the sake of being happy.
You have a prison grin. They say, it’s your mouth that keeps you captive.
You talk crazy before you talk freedom. It is no wonder you are missing.
Look, how your whole life is condensed to height, weight, eye color, tattoos, piercings.
You, get to be an art gallery on a light pole.
You, do not get to be someone’s favorite song.
You, get to be broken record.
You, do not get an amber Alert if your name is not Amber.
You, a name too hard to pronounce, must mean you difficult too.
Must mean you not worthy of a chorus to sing you into a prayer.
Must make you a melody we forgot the words too, a quiet hum.
A flash mob with no mob and no flash.
You, a dance too hard to memorize.
When they stumble upon your lifeless body in a lake,
they point out every other time in your life you’ve drowned.
Medical records will float to the surface before your body does:
Depression, Bi-Polar.
They will say you did this to yourself.
Girls like you are always found submerged in a body of water.
Always baptized, never saved.
Maybe it was because of the last time
you ran away with the boy
who looked like God.
Maybe it was because of the way
you came back three days later
like you were God.
Maybe they expected you
to resurrect like this, again,
like you have always been a dead girl,
wanting to rise,
glory and miracle.
Like you just wanted your loved ones
to gather around you
so you made a funeral of your body.
Maybe they did not search for you
because you being gone
was not enough evidence
that you were indeed missing.
You so loud, the police are sure
your family will find you.
Crying wolf. Crying rape. Crying.
You so loud
that when you are silent,
they point your parents in the direction
of your echo and say look,
a cave in love with her own darkness.
When the media does not report the news
of your disappearance, you are not a girl worthy of a torch.
You, girl with bonfire hair, do not get to be illuminated.
Do not get to smile for the sake of being happy.
You have a prison grin. They say, it’s your mouth that keeps you captive.
You talk crazy before you talk freedom. It is no wonder you are missing.
Look, how your whole life is condensed to height, weight, eye color, tattoos, piercings.
You, get to be an art gallery on a light pole.
You, do not get to be someone’s favorite song.
You, get to be broken record.
You, do not get an amber Alert if your name is not Amber.
You, a name too hard to pronounce, must mean you difficult too.
Must mean you not worthy of a chorus to sing you into a prayer.
Must make you a melody we forgot the words too, a quiet hum.
A flash mob with no mob and no flash.
You, a dance too hard to memorize.
When they stumble upon your lifeless body in a lake,
they point out every other time in your life you’ve drowned.
Medical records will float to the surface before your body does:
Depression, Bi-Polar.
They will say you did this to yourself.
Girls like you are always found submerged in a body of water.
Always baptized, never saved.
Wednesday, August 17, 2016
What Trump Voters May Be Thinking
By Calvin Trillin
A man who goes ballistic
At trivial rebukes
Is just the sort of person
One wants in charge of nukes
At trivial rebukes
Is just the sort of person
One wants in charge of nukes
Tuesday, August 16, 2016
two nights before my 72nd birthday
By Charles Bukowski
sitting here on a boiling hot night while
after winning $232 at the track.
there's not much I can tell you except
if it weren't for my bad right leg
I don't feel much different than I did
30 or 40 years ago (except that
now I have more money and should be able
to afford a decent
burial). also,
I drive better automobiles and have
stopped carrying a
switchblade.
I am still looking for a hero, a role model,
but can't find one.
I am no more tolerant of Humanity
than I ever was.
I am not bored with myself and find
that I am the only one I can
turn to in time of
crisis.
I've been ready to die for decades and
I've been practicing, polishing up
for that end
but it's very
hot tonight
and I can think of little but
this fine cabernet,
that's gift enough for me.
sometimes I can't
believe I've come this far,
this has to be some kind of goddamned
miracle!
just another old guy
blinking at the forces,
smiling a little,
as the cities tremble and the left
hand rises,
clutching
something
real.
sitting here on a boiling hot night while
after winning $232 at the track.
there's not much I can tell you except
if it weren't for my bad right leg
I don't feel much different than I did
30 or 40 years ago (except that
now I have more money and should be able
to afford a decent
burial). also,
I drive better automobiles and have
stopped carrying a
switchblade.
I am still looking for a hero, a role model,
but can't find one.
I am no more tolerant of Humanity
than I ever was.
I am not bored with myself and find
that I am the only one I can
turn to in time of
crisis.
I've been ready to die for decades and
I've been practicing, polishing up
for that end
but it's very
hot tonight
and I can think of little but
this fine cabernet,
that's gift enough for me.
sometimes I can't
believe I've come this far,
this has to be some kind of goddamned
miracle!
just another old guy
blinking at the forces,
smiling a little,
as the cities tremble and the left
hand rises,
clutching
something
real.
Tuesday, August 9, 2016
Your Shoulders Hold Up the World
By Carlos Drummond de Andrade
A time comes when we no longer can say:
A time of total cleaning up.
A time when we no longer can say: my love.
Because love proved useless.
And the eyes don't cry.
And the hands do only rough work.
And the heart is dry.
They knock at our door in vain, we won't open.
We remain alone, the light turned off,
and our enormous eyes shine in the dark.
It is obvious we no longer know how to suffer.
And we want nothing from our friends.
Who cares if old age comes, what is old age?
Our shoulders are holding up the world
and it's lighter than a child's hand.
>Wars, famine, family fights inside buildings
>prove only that life goes on
and not everybody has freed themselves yet.
Some (the delicate ones) judging the spectacle cruel
will prefer to die.
A time comes when death doesn't help.
A time comes when life is an order.
A time comes when we no longer can say:
A time of total cleaning up.
A time when we no longer can say: my love.
Because love proved useless.
And the eyes don't cry.
And the hands do only rough work.
And the heart is dry.
They knock at our door in vain, we won't open.
We remain alone, the light turned off,
and our enormous eyes shine in the dark.
It is obvious we no longer know how to suffer.
And we want nothing from our friends.
Who cares if old age comes, what is old age?
Our shoulders are holding up the world
and it's lighter than a child's hand.
>Wars, famine, family fights inside buildings
>prove only that life goes on
and not everybody has freed themselves yet.
Some (the delicate ones) judging the spectacle cruel
will prefer to die.
A time comes when death doesn't help.
A time comes when life is an order.
Thursday, August 4, 2016
Tao Te Ching, #31
Weapons are the tools of violence;
all decent men detest them.
Weapons are the tools of fear;
a decent man will avoid them
except in the direst of necessity
and, if compelled, will use them
only with the utmost restraint.
Peace is his highest value.
If the peace has been shattered,
how can he be content?
His enemies are not demons,
but human beings like himself.
He doesn't wish them personal harm.
Nor does he rejoice in victory.
How could he rejoice in victory
and delight in the slaughter of men?
all decent men detest them.
Weapons are the tools of fear;
a decent man will avoid them
except in the direst of necessity
and, if compelled, will use them
only with the utmost restraint.
Peace is his highest value.
If the peace has been shattered,
how can he be content?
His enemies are not demons,
but human beings like himself.
He doesn't wish them personal harm.
Nor does he rejoice in victory.
How could he rejoice in victory
and delight in the slaughter of men?
He enters a battle gravely,
with sorrow and with great compassion,
as if he were attending a funeral.
with sorrow and with great compassion,
as if he were attending a funeral.
Wednesday, July 27, 2016
“Your Luck Is About To Change”
By Susan Elizabeth Howe
(A fortune cookie)
Ominous inscrutable Chinese news
to get just before Christmas,
considering my reasonable health,
marriage spicy as moo-goo-gai-pan,
career running like a not-too-old Chevrolet.
Not bad, considering what can go wrong:
the bony finger of Uncle Sam
might point out my husband,
my own national guard,
and set him in Afghanistan;
my boss could take a personal interest;
the pain in my left knee could spread to my right.
Still, as the old year tips into the new,
I insist on the infant hope, gooing and kicking
his legs in the air. I won't give in
to the dark, the sub-zero weather, the fog,
or even the neighbors' Nativity.
Their four-year-old has arranged
his whole legion of dinosaurs
so they, too, worship the child,
joining the cow and sheep. Or else,
ultimate mortals, they've come to eat
ox and camel, Mary and Joseph,
then savor the newborn babe.
(A fortune cookie)
Ominous inscrutable Chinese news
to get just before Christmas,
considering my reasonable health,
marriage spicy as moo-goo-gai-pan,
career running like a not-too-old Chevrolet.
Not bad, considering what can go wrong:
the bony finger of Uncle Sam
might point out my husband,
my own national guard,
and set him in Afghanistan;
my boss could take a personal interest;
the pain in my left knee could spread to my right.
Still, as the old year tips into the new,
I insist on the infant hope, gooing and kicking
his legs in the air. I won't give in
to the dark, the sub-zero weather, the fog,
or even the neighbors' Nativity.
Their four-year-old has arranged
his whole legion of dinosaurs
so they, too, worship the child,
joining the cow and sheep. Or else,
ultimate mortals, they've come to eat
ox and camel, Mary and Joseph,
then savor the newborn babe.
Wednesday, July 20, 2016
White Boy Privilege
By Royce Mann
Dear women, I am sorry.
Dear black people, I am sorry.
Dear Asian Americans, dear Native
Americans, dear immigrants who come
here seeking a better life, I am sorry.
Dear everyone who isn’t a middle or
upper-class white boy, I am sorry.
I have started life at the
top of the ladder, while you were born on the first rung.
I say now that I would change places
with you in an instant, but if given the
opportunity, would I?
Probably not. Because to be honest,
being privileged is awesome.
I’m not saying that you and me on
different rungs of the ladder is how I want it to stay,
I’m not saying any part of me for one moment has even liked it that way,
I’m just saying, I fucking love being
privileged and I’m not ready to give that away.
I love it, because I can say “fucking”
and not one of you is attributing that to
the fact that everyone of my skin color
has a dirty mouth.
I love it, because I don’t have to spend
an hour every morning putting on
makeup to meet other people’s standards.
I love it, because I can worry about
what kind of food is on my plate,
instead of whether or not there will be food on my plate.
I love it, because when I see a police officer,
I see someone who’s on my side.
To be honest, I’m scared of what it would be like
if I wasn’t on the top rung.
If the tables were turned, and I couldn’t
have my white boy privilege safety blankie to protect me.
If I lived a life by what I lack, not what I have,
if I lived a life in which when I failed,
the world would say ‘Told you so.’
If I lived the life that you live.
When I was born, I had a success story
already written for me. You, you were
given a pen and no paper.
I’ve always felt that that’s unfair,
but I’ve never dared to speak up because I’ve been too scared.
Well, now I realize that there’s enough blankie to be shared.
Everyone should have the privileges
that I have. In fact, they should be rights instead.
Everyone’s stories should be written,
o all they have to do is get it read.
Enough said.
No, not enough said.
It is embarrassing that we still live in a world
in which we judge another person’s character
by the size of their paycheck, the color of their skin,
or the type of chromosomes they have.
It is embarrassing that we tell our kids
that it is not their personality,
but instead those same chromosomes that get to dictate
what color clothes they wear, and how short they cut their hair.
But most of all, it is embarrassing that we deny this,
that we claim to live in an equal country in an equal world.
We say that women can vote? Well,
guess what? They can run a country,
own a company, and throw a nasty curveball as well.
We just don’t give them the chance to.
I know it wasn’t us 8th grade white boys
who created this system, but we profit from it every day.
We don’t notice these privileges though, because
they don’t come in the form of things we gain,
but rather the lack of injustices that we endure.
Because of my gender, I can watch any sport on TV
and feel like that could be me one day.
Because of my race, I can eat in a fancy restaurant
without the wait staff expecting me to steal the silverware.
Thanks to my parents’ salary, I go to a school
that brings my dreams closer instead of pushing them away.
Dear white boys, I’m not sorry.
I don’t care if you think that feminists are taking over the world,
or that Black Lives Matter has gotten a little too strong,
because that’s bullshit.
I get that change can be scary, but equality shouldn’t be.
Hey white boys, it’s time to act like a woman.
To be strong and make a difference. It’s time to let go of that fear.
It’s time to take that ladder and turn it into a bridge.
Dear women, I am sorry.
Dear black people, I am sorry.
Dear Asian Americans, dear Native
Americans, dear immigrants who come
here seeking a better life, I am sorry.
Dear everyone who isn’t a middle or
upper-class white boy, I am sorry.
I have started life at the
top of the ladder, while you were born on the first rung.
I say now that I would change places
with you in an instant, but if given the
opportunity, would I?
Probably not. Because to be honest,
being privileged is awesome.
I’m not saying that you and me on
different rungs of the ladder is how I want it to stay,
I’m not saying any part of me for one moment has even liked it that way,
I’m just saying, I fucking love being
privileged and I’m not ready to give that away.
I love it, because I can say “fucking”
and not one of you is attributing that to
the fact that everyone of my skin color
has a dirty mouth.
I love it, because I don’t have to spend
an hour every morning putting on
makeup to meet other people’s standards.
I love it, because I can worry about
what kind of food is on my plate,
instead of whether or not there will be food on my plate.
I love it, because when I see a police officer,
I see someone who’s on my side.
To be honest, I’m scared of what it would be like
if I wasn’t on the top rung.
If the tables were turned, and I couldn’t
have my white boy privilege safety blankie to protect me.
If I lived a life by what I lack, not what I have,
if I lived a life in which when I failed,
the world would say ‘Told you so.’
If I lived the life that you live.
When I was born, I had a success story
already written for me. You, you were
given a pen and no paper.
I’ve always felt that that’s unfair,
but I’ve never dared to speak up because I’ve been too scared.
Well, now I realize that there’s enough blankie to be shared.
Everyone should have the privileges
that I have. In fact, they should be rights instead.
Everyone’s stories should be written,
o all they have to do is get it read.
Enough said.
No, not enough said.
It is embarrassing that we still live in a world
in which we judge another person’s character
by the size of their paycheck, the color of their skin,
or the type of chromosomes they have.
It is embarrassing that we tell our kids
that it is not their personality,
but instead those same chromosomes that get to dictate
what color clothes they wear, and how short they cut their hair.
But most of all, it is embarrassing that we deny this,
that we claim to live in an equal country in an equal world.
We say that women can vote? Well,
guess what? They can run a country,
own a company, and throw a nasty curveball as well.
We just don’t give them the chance to.
I know it wasn’t us 8th grade white boys
who created this system, but we profit from it every day.
We don’t notice these privileges though, because
they don’t come in the form of things we gain,
but rather the lack of injustices that we endure.
Because of my gender, I can watch any sport on TV
and feel like that could be me one day.
Because of my race, I can eat in a fancy restaurant
without the wait staff expecting me to steal the silverware.
Thanks to my parents’ salary, I go to a school
that brings my dreams closer instead of pushing them away.
Dear white boys, I’m not sorry.
I don’t care if you think that feminists are taking over the world,
or that Black Lives Matter has gotten a little too strong,
because that’s bullshit.
I get that change can be scary, but equality shouldn’t be.
Hey white boys, it’s time to act like a woman.
To be strong and make a difference. It’s time to let go of that fear.
It’s time to take that ladder and turn it into a bridge.
Monday, July 11, 2016
Power
By Audre Lorde
The difference between poetry and rhetoric
is being ready to kill
yourself
instead of your children.
I am trapped on a desert of raw gunshot wounds
and a dead child dragging his shattered black
face off the edge of my sleep
blood from his punctured cheeks and shoulders
is the only liquid for miles
and my stomach
churns at the imagined taste while
my mouth splits into dry lips
without loyalty or reason
thirsting for the wetness of his blood
as it sinks into the whiteness
of the desert where I am lost
without imagery or magic
trying to make power out of hatred and destruction
trying to heal my dying son with kisses
only the sun will bleach his bones quicker.
A policeman who shot down a ten year old in Queens
stood over the boy with his cop shoes in childish blood
and a voice said “Die you little motherfucker” and
there are tapes to prove it. At his trial
this policeman said in his own defense
“I didn't notice the size nor nothing else
only the color”. And
there are tapes to prove that, too.
Today that 37 year old white man
with 13 years of police forcing
was set free
by eleven white men who said they were satisfied
justice had been done
and one Black Woman who said
“They convinced me” meaning
they had dragged her 4'10'' black Woman's frame
over the hot coals
of four centuries of white male approval
until she let go
the first real power she ever had
and lined her own womb with cement
to make a graveyard for our children.
I have not been able to touch the destruction
within me.
But unless I learn to use
the difference between poetry and rhetoric
my power too will run corrupt as poisonous mold
or lie limp and useless as an unconnected wire
and one day I will take my teenaged plug
and connect it to the nearest socket
raping an 85 year old white woman
who is somebody's mother
and as I beat her senseless and set a torch to her bed
a greek chorus will be singing in 3/4 time
“Poor thing. She never hurt a soul. What beasts they are.”
The difference between poetry and rhetoric
is being ready to kill
yourself
instead of your children.
I am trapped on a desert of raw gunshot wounds
and a dead child dragging his shattered black
face off the edge of my sleep
blood from his punctured cheeks and shoulders
is the only liquid for miles
and my stomach
churns at the imagined taste while
my mouth splits into dry lips
without loyalty or reason
thirsting for the wetness of his blood
as it sinks into the whiteness
of the desert where I am lost
without imagery or magic
trying to make power out of hatred and destruction
trying to heal my dying son with kisses
only the sun will bleach his bones quicker.
A policeman who shot down a ten year old in Queens
stood over the boy with his cop shoes in childish blood
and a voice said “Die you little motherfucker” and
there are tapes to prove it. At his trial
this policeman said in his own defense
“I didn't notice the size nor nothing else
only the color”. And
there are tapes to prove that, too.
Today that 37 year old white man
with 13 years of police forcing
was set free
by eleven white men who said they were satisfied
justice had been done
and one Black Woman who said
“They convinced me” meaning
they had dragged her 4'10'' black Woman's frame
over the hot coals
of four centuries of white male approval
until she let go
the first real power she ever had
and lined her own womb with cement
to make a graveyard for our children.
I have not been able to touch the destruction
within me.
But unless I learn to use
the difference between poetry and rhetoric
my power too will run corrupt as poisonous mold
or lie limp and useless as an unconnected wire
and one day I will take my teenaged plug
and connect it to the nearest socket
raping an 85 year old white woman
who is somebody's mother
and as I beat her senseless and set a torch to her bed
a greek chorus will be singing in 3/4 time
“Poor thing. She never hurt a soul. What beasts they are.”
Thursday, July 7, 2016
The Revolver
By Carl Sandburg
Here is a revolver.
It has an amazing language all its own.
It delivers unmistakable ultimatums.
It is the last word.
A simple, little human forefinger can tell a terrible story with it.
Hunger, fear, revenge, robbery hide behind it.
It is the claw of the jungle made quick and powerful.
It is the club of the savage turned to magnificent precision.
It is more rapid than any judge or court of law.
It is less subtle and treacherous than any one lawyer or ten.
When it has spoken, the case can not be appealed to the supreme court, nor any mandamus nor any injunction nor any stay of execution in and interfere with the original purpose.
And nothing in human philosophy persists more strangely than the old belief that God is always on the side of those who have the most revolvers.
This poem was unpublished until a professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign found it, and the Chicago Tribune published it in 2013.
Here is a revolver.
It has an amazing language all its own.
It delivers unmistakable ultimatums.
It is the last word.
A simple, little human forefinger can tell a terrible story with it.
Hunger, fear, revenge, robbery hide behind it.
It is the claw of the jungle made quick and powerful.
It is the club of the savage turned to magnificent precision.
It is more rapid than any judge or court of law.
It is less subtle and treacherous than any one lawyer or ten.
When it has spoken, the case can not be appealed to the supreme court, nor any mandamus nor any injunction nor any stay of execution in and interfere with the original purpose.
And nothing in human philosophy persists more strangely than the old belief that God is always on the side of those who have the most revolvers.
This poem was unpublished until a professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign found it, and the Chicago Tribune published it in 2013.
Saturday, July 2, 2016
Never Shall I Forget
By Ellie Wiesel
Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, that turned my life into one long night seven times sealed.
Never shall I forget that smoke.
Never shall I forget the small faces of the children whose bodies I saw transformed into smoke under a silent sky.
Never shall I forget those flames that consumed my faith for ever.
Never shall I forget the nocturnal silence that deprived me for all eternity of the desire to live.
Never shall I forget those moments that murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to ashes.
Never shall I forget those things, even were I condemned to live
as long as God Himself.
Never.
Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, that turned my life into one long night seven times sealed.
Never shall I forget that smoke.
Never shall I forget the small faces of the children whose bodies I saw transformed into smoke under a silent sky.
Never shall I forget those flames that consumed my faith for ever.
Never shall I forget the nocturnal silence that deprived me for all eternity of the desire to live.
Never shall I forget those moments that murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to ashes.
Never shall I forget those things, even were I condemned to live
as long as God Himself.
Never.
Tuesday, June 28, 2016
I Listen to Istanbul
By Orhan Veli Kanik
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed:
The cool covered bazaar,
Mahmutpasha, the courtyards
Filled with warbling pigeons,
Hammer sounds from the docks,
Smells of sweat in my lovely Spring wind;
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed.
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed:
An old world drunk in its head,
A waterfront palace with a dark boat shed,
The humming of the lodos ceases inside;
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed.
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed:
A pretty young girl walks by
Chased by taunts, come-ons and curses,
Something falls from my hand—
Surely a rose;
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed.
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed:
A bird is fluttering in your skirts,
Your brow is hot, I know,
Your lips are wet, I know, I know,
A white moon rises behind the pistachio trees—
I understand the pounding of your heart;
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed.
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed:
The cool covered bazaar,
Mahmutpasha, the courtyards
Filled with warbling pigeons,
Hammer sounds from the docks,
Smells of sweat in my lovely Spring wind;
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed.
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed:
An old world drunk in its head,
A waterfront palace with a dark boat shed,
The humming of the lodos ceases inside;
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed.
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed:
A pretty young girl walks by
Chased by taunts, come-ons and curses,
Something falls from my hand—
Surely a rose;
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed.
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed:
A bird is fluttering in your skirts,
Your brow is hot, I know,
Your lips are wet, I know, I know,
A white moon rises behind the pistachio trees—
I understand the pounding of your heart;
I listen to Istanbul, my eyes closed.
Wednesday, June 15, 2016
For colored boys who speak softly
By Yosimar Reyes
For colored boys
I will crucify myself like Christ
let my blood purify and sanctify these words
create a doctrine and go knocking door to door
letting the people know that messiahs are here
that we are messengers
even though we embody the word queer
that we are a reminder of
how colonization has destroyed nuestra cultura
they burned our villages, nuestros pueblos
implemented homophobia, sexism, and machismo
in las cabezas de nuestros abuelos
brainwashed our ancestors into believing
that boys like us are a manifestation of the devil
For colored boys who speak softly
I'll remind the world that centuries ago
we were shamans and healers
gifted warriors
two-spirited people highly respected by villagers
but now we've become
nothing more than fags and queers
making ourselves believe
that capitalism will solve our issue...
I'll recognize
that there is more than one wound to heal
more than one struggle that we feel
but this ignorance blocks us from seeing
the greater picture, the greater evil
and these same issues
these same issues transcend the borders
because brothers and sisters
in Oaxaca
in Chiapas
in the Philippines
in Iraq
are resisting this very same system...
For colored boys
I will remind my people
que somos diferente
que somos gente
con cultura, con orgullo, con poder
we are people
and with the people we stand
breaking borders and stereotypes
like this system that exploited our hands...
Tuesday, June 14, 2016
The War Continues
By Cherríe Moraga
Flesh is full
of holes.
It is made
to breathe
secrete
receive.
It is nothing
against
bombs
and
bullets.
It is not meant
to be a barrier
against
anything.
But this dark flesh
will resist you flee
you who believe
you are not made
of the same
skin
and
bones.
Flesh is full
of holes.
It is made
to breathe
secrete
receive.
It is nothing
against
bombs
and
bullets.
It is not meant
to be a barrier
against
anything.
But this dark flesh
will resist you flee
you who believe
you are not made
of the same
skin
and
bones.
Monday, May 30, 2016
Memorial Day for the War Dead
By Yehuda Amichai
Memorial day for the war dead. Add now
the grief of all your losses to their grief,
even of a woman that has left you. Mix
sorrow with sorrow, like time-saving history,
which stacks holiday and sacrifice and mourning
on one day for easy, convenient memory.
Oh, sweet world soaked, like bread,
in sweet milk for the terrible toothless God.
"Behind all this some great happiness is hiding."
No use to weep inside and to scream outside.
Behind all this perhaps some great happiness is hiding.
Memorial day. Bitter salt is dressed up
as a little girl with flowers.
The streets are cordoned off with ropes,
for the marching together of the living and the dead.
Children with a grief not their own march slowly,
like stepping over broken glass.
The flautist's mouth will stay like that for many days.
A dead soldier swims above little heads
with the swimming movements of the dead,
with the ancient error the dead have
about the place of the living water.
A flag loses contact with reality and flies off.
A shopwindow is decorated with
dresses of beautiful women, in blue and white.
And everything in three languages:
Hebrew, Arabic, and Death.
A great and royal animal is dying
all through the night under the jasmine
tree with a constant stare at the world.
A man whose son died in the war walks in the street
like a woman with a dead embryo in her womb.
"Behind all this some great happiness is hiding."
Memorial day for the war dead. Add now
the grief of all your losses to their grief,
even of a woman that has left you. Mix
sorrow with sorrow, like time-saving history,
which stacks holiday and sacrifice and mourning
on one day for easy, convenient memory.
Oh, sweet world soaked, like bread,
in sweet milk for the terrible toothless God.
"Behind all this some great happiness is hiding."
No use to weep inside and to scream outside.
Behind all this perhaps some great happiness is hiding.
Memorial day. Bitter salt is dressed up
as a little girl with flowers.
The streets are cordoned off with ropes,
for the marching together of the living and the dead.
Children with a grief not their own march slowly,
like stepping over broken glass.
The flautist's mouth will stay like that for many days.
A dead soldier swims above little heads
with the swimming movements of the dead,
with the ancient error the dead have
about the place of the living water.
A flag loses contact with reality and flies off.
A shopwindow is decorated with
dresses of beautiful women, in blue and white.
And everything in three languages:
Hebrew, Arabic, and Death.
A great and royal animal is dying
all through the night under the jasmine
tree with a constant stare at the world.
A man whose son died in the war walks in the street
like a woman with a dead embryo in her womb.
"Behind all this some great happiness is hiding."
Sunday, May 29, 2016
Touched by An Angel
By Maya Angelou
We, unaccustomed to courage
exiles from delight
live coiled in shells of loneliness
until love leaves its high holy temple
and comes into our sight
to liberate us into life.
Love arrives
and in its train come ecstasies
old memories of pleasure
ancient histories of pain.
Yet if we are bold,
love strikes away the chains of fear
from our souls.
We are weaned from our timidity
In the flush of love's light
we dare be brave
And suddenly we see
that love costs all we are
and will ever be.
Yet it is only love
which sets us free.
We, unaccustomed to courage
exiles from delight
live coiled in shells of loneliness
until love leaves its high holy temple
and comes into our sight
to liberate us into life.
Love arrives
and in its train come ecstasies
old memories of pleasure
ancient histories of pain.
Yet if we are bold,
love strikes away the chains of fear
from our souls.
We are weaned from our timidity
In the flush of love's light
we dare be brave
And suddenly we see
that love costs all we are
and will ever be.
Yet it is only love
which sets us free.
Friday, May 27, 2016
An Open Letter to the Christian Right From a Follower of Christ
By Ryk McIntyre
May God forgive what you’ve done to Jesus.
You’ve taken the hand he taught you to reach out with,
turned it into a fist, and use it to feed your children intolerance.
You’re lost souls standing by the only road they know,
putting up signs that read “Only Way.”
Name-dropping Jesus like you’re praying hard
to get into the after-party. But once inside
you’d be the first to slam the door on the rest,
singing “Praise the Lord and Pass the Limited Access!”
Your songs describe a Prince of Peace on the attack--
I want my Jesus back.
I’m sick in my soul with all you Onward Soldiers
carrying Jesus around in a cross-draw holster,
unaware of all the damage that you do:
when most people think of Christians, they picture you
arming a religion Jesus never would have blessed.
putting words in Jesus’ mouth that would never pass his lips.
Blind to the world, eyes fixed on the day Jesus returns.
What makes you think he left?
Maybe he’ll walk into your church today, dressed like a health inspector
asking, “What garbage are you serving in my Father’s House?
Your hands are red, and you’ve got weapons in your mouth?”
You use the Cross to rally anti-immigrant laws, until
all but one finger on Liberty’s right hand’s been sawn off, so
all foreigners see is an iron lady saying “Fuck You” with a torch.
But when did Jesus say close the doors?
or ‘Blessed are the locked-down borders’?
What he said was "In my Name, do charitable acts."
Give me my Jesus back.
Stop claiming the Sermon Mount as sniper vantage
for the weapons you keep in your mouth.
Stop whoring for dollars like God’s overdrawn his bank account.
Stop spreading a gospel of bondage and sin.
You’re not listening, so here’s an example:
whether you argue abortion’s not a right but murder?
It doesn’t matter. Either way, Jesus still loves her.
It’s time to stop judging and start looking for real results.
If you hate abortion that much, open free daycares or shut up.
And Jesus doesn’t hate gays, never did. That’s St. Paul and Leviticus,
and they were simply wrong because "Hate" isn’t what a Loving God does.
The only thing Jesus cares about gay marriage is that they're happy.
In a world of war and starvation, Jerry Falwell takes on the Teletubbies?
Those weapons in your mouth make your every word perverse.
Fred Phelps and your Westboro Baptist Church?
I could do a whole poem on you. But you’re not worth it.
I'm calling out the Patriarchs of Christian America: get right
with Jesus: Stop hating other religions, try a slice of humble, see the light
as it falls across a world where’s there’s so much real suffering endured
Instead of bibles, try giving away food to the hungry and poor
Your false Jesus is a Warlord, fraudulently caucasian.
I'm taking my Jesus back. Keep your pale imitation.
You’ve taken the hand
Jesus taught you to reach out with, and balled it into a fist.
Your sin is thinking there could be anything Holy in this.
May God forgive what you’ve done to Jesus.
You’ve taken the hand he taught you to reach out with,
turned it into a fist, and use it to feed your children intolerance.
You’re lost souls standing by the only road they know,
putting up signs that read “Only Way.”
Name-dropping Jesus like you’re praying hard
to get into the after-party. But once inside
you’d be the first to slam the door on the rest,
singing “Praise the Lord and Pass the Limited Access!”
Your songs describe a Prince of Peace on the attack--
I want my Jesus back.
I’m sick in my soul with all you Onward Soldiers
carrying Jesus around in a cross-draw holster,
unaware of all the damage that you do:
when most people think of Christians, they picture you
arming a religion Jesus never would have blessed.
putting words in Jesus’ mouth that would never pass his lips.
Blind to the world, eyes fixed on the day Jesus returns.
What makes you think he left?
Maybe he’ll walk into your church today, dressed like a health inspector
asking, “What garbage are you serving in my Father’s House?
Your hands are red, and you’ve got weapons in your mouth?”
You use the Cross to rally anti-immigrant laws, until
all but one finger on Liberty’s right hand’s been sawn off, so
all foreigners see is an iron lady saying “Fuck You” with a torch.
But when did Jesus say close the doors?
or ‘Blessed are the locked-down borders’?
What he said was "In my Name, do charitable acts."
Give me my Jesus back.
Stop claiming the Sermon Mount as sniper vantage
for the weapons you keep in your mouth.
Stop whoring for dollars like God’s overdrawn his bank account.
Stop spreading a gospel of bondage and sin.
You’re not listening, so here’s an example:
whether you argue abortion’s not a right but murder?
It doesn’t matter. Either way, Jesus still loves her.
It’s time to stop judging and start looking for real results.
If you hate abortion that much, open free daycares or shut up.
And Jesus doesn’t hate gays, never did. That’s St. Paul and Leviticus,
and they were simply wrong because "Hate" isn’t what a Loving God does.
The only thing Jesus cares about gay marriage is that they're happy.
In a world of war and starvation, Jerry Falwell takes on the Teletubbies?
Those weapons in your mouth make your every word perverse.
Fred Phelps and your Westboro Baptist Church?
I could do a whole poem on you. But you’re not worth it.
I'm calling out the Patriarchs of Christian America: get right
with Jesus: Stop hating other religions, try a slice of humble, see the light
as it falls across a world where’s there’s so much real suffering endured
Instead of bibles, try giving away food to the hungry and poor
Your false Jesus is a Warlord, fraudulently caucasian.
I'm taking my Jesus back. Keep your pale imitation.
You’ve taken the hand
Jesus taught you to reach out with, and balled it into a fist.
Your sin is thinking there could be anything Holy in this.
Thursday, May 19, 2016
The Great Escape
By Charles Bukowski
listen, he said, you ever seen a bunch of crabs in a
bucket?
no, I told him.
well, what happens is that now and then one crab
will climb up on top of the others
and begin to climb toward the top of the bucket,
then, just as he's about to escape
another crab grabs him and pulls him back
down.
really? I asked.
really, he said, and this job is just like that, none
of the others want anybody to get out of
here. that's just the way it is
in the postal service!
I believe you, I said.
just then the supervisor walked up and said,
you fellows were talking.
there is no talking allowed on this
job.
I had been there for eleven and one-half
years.
I got up off my stool and climbed right up the
supervisor
and then I reached up and pulled myself right
out of there.
it was so easy it was unbelievable.
but none of the others followed me.
and after that, whenever I had crab legs
I thought about that place.
I must have thought about that place
maybe 5 or 6 times
before I switched to lobster
listen, he said, you ever seen a bunch of crabs in a
bucket?
no, I told him.
well, what happens is that now and then one crab
will climb up on top of the others
and begin to climb toward the top of the bucket,
then, just as he's about to escape
another crab grabs him and pulls him back
down.
really? I asked.
really, he said, and this job is just like that, none
of the others want anybody to get out of
here. that's just the way it is
in the postal service!
I believe you, I said.
just then the supervisor walked up and said,
you fellows were talking.
there is no talking allowed on this
job.
I had been there for eleven and one-half
years.
I got up off my stool and climbed right up the
supervisor
and then I reached up and pulled myself right
out of there.
it was so easy it was unbelievable.
but none of the others followed me.
and after that, whenever I had crab legs
I thought about that place.
I must have thought about that place
maybe 5 or 6 times
before I switched to lobster
Wednesday, May 18, 2016
Blind Spot
By Cheryl J. Fish
Never mended my blind spot—thought the volcano swerved
>A graphic novel monster, stationary molten rock
At Windy Ridge, Mount St. Helens, 30 years post-eruption
Cartoon-like, cracked.
Cell phone powers up approaching the ridge—four bars.
A series of beeps in your pocket
Imagine those hikers falling from a snow cornice
Thinking they stood on solid rock, not packed snow
Posing for a photo, they slid down the south face
Blurred in winter’s majestic light, flashes of old growth forest
Charred in pyroclastic flow
No more solid than the peak that once glistened distant
On blue Portland days
What you can’t fathom finds you
Objects unto obliteration.
Never mended my blind spot—thought the volcano swerved
>A graphic novel monster, stationary molten rock
At Windy Ridge, Mount St. Helens, 30 years post-eruption
Cartoon-like, cracked.
Cell phone powers up approaching the ridge—four bars.
A series of beeps in your pocket
Imagine those hikers falling from a snow cornice
Thinking they stood on solid rock, not packed snow
Posing for a photo, they slid down the south face
Blurred in winter’s majestic light, flashes of old growth forest
Charred in pyroclastic flow
No more solid than the peak that once glistened distant
On blue Portland days
What you can’t fathom finds you
Objects unto obliteration.
Wednesday, May 11, 2016
Untitled
By Naina Kataria
When a man tells me
I’m beautiful
I don’t believe him.
Instead, I relive my days in high school
>When no matter how good I was
I was always the girl with a moustache
He doesn’t know what it’s like
to grow up in your maternal family
Where your body is the only one that
Proudly boasts of your father’s X
While your mother’s X sits back and pities
It’s unladylike-ness
He doesn’t know the teenager
Who filled her corners with
Empty consolations of
Being loved for who she was - someday.
He doesn’t know hypocrisy.
He doesn’t know of the world that
tells you to ‘be yourself’
and sells you a fair and lovely shade card
in the same fucking breath
He doesn’t know of the hot wax and the laser
whose only purpose is to
replace your innocent skin
with its own brand of womanhood
He doesn’t know of the veet and the bleach
That uproot your robust hair
in the name of hygiene
Hygiene, which when followed by men
makes them gay and unmanly
He doesn’t know how unruly eyebrows are tamed
and how unibrows die a silent death
All to preserve beauty
And of the torturous miracles that happen
Inside the doors marked
"WOMEN ONLY"
So when a man calls me beautiful
I throw at him, a smile; a smile that remained
After everything the strip pulled away
And I dare him
To wait
Till my hair grows back.
This poem was originally published on Facebook by the author, and then went viral.
When a man tells me
I’m beautiful
I don’t believe him.
Instead, I relive my days in high school
>When no matter how good I was
I was always the girl with a moustache
He doesn’t know what it’s like
to grow up in your maternal family
Where your body is the only one that
Proudly boasts of your father’s X
While your mother’s X sits back and pities
It’s unladylike-ness
He doesn’t know the teenager
Who filled her corners with
Empty consolations of
Being loved for who she was - someday.
He doesn’t know hypocrisy.
He doesn’t know of the world that
tells you to ‘be yourself’
and sells you a fair and lovely shade card
in the same fucking breath
He doesn’t know of the hot wax and the laser
whose only purpose is to
replace your innocent skin
with its own brand of womanhood
He doesn’t know of the veet and the bleach
That uproot your robust hair
in the name of hygiene
Hygiene, which when followed by men
makes them gay and unmanly
He doesn’t know how unruly eyebrows are tamed
and how unibrows die a silent death
All to preserve beauty
And of the torturous miracles that happen
Inside the doors marked
"WOMEN ONLY"
So when a man calls me beautiful
I throw at him, a smile; a smile that remained
After everything the strip pulled away
And I dare him
To wait
Till my hair grows back.
This poem was originally published on Facebook by the author, and then went viral.
Thursday, April 28, 2016
On Days When I am Too Queer For This World
By Susan Wolf
there’s no place to run
except back to sleep where they can’t look at my papers,
search and confiscate the simple parts of myself
the parts that show
parts they say don’t ring true
because I am not a bell, a homogenous object
vibrations do no travel across me unchanged
I am not pure metal, ripped from pure earth
refined, forged, beaten smooth
smooth touch, smooth sound, smooth talk about smooth gods
makes the feel all of a piece
I am a child of rougher gods
I cut their fingers and make them bleed
grinding crunch
becomes earthquake vibration
odd harmonics cascade
as I collide with this world where I wake up
alarm clock bell
drags me into clattering hum of this sleep waking drone
there is no place to run
except back to sleep
in search of a better waking, better place
though no place rings any more true to me than I do to
guards, soldiers, police
they can see, hear, feel it right down to their boots
dark skinned women
who don’t say the words the boys yell, MARICON
but think it
as they pull their children closer, away down the aisle
pale skinned women push their lips together even more tightly
stare right through me
boys, man-boys still sweating from the gym
wait in the check-out line
bulging bodies make the motion of elbowing me out of the way
they are standing still
breathing hard
impatient waiting
as the cashier addresses me by two different pronouns in the same sentence
calls me ma’am and sir before handing me my change
my leave to go out
home
up the hill
door slam
there is no place to run
except back to sleep
when this world is a swimming silver mirage
I can see right through it all
clear through to nothing
not like other spheres
that look surreal, like paintings
but are solid if I touch them
everything bends away from me here
so that I can never connect
the illusion of my anti-gravity bends the illusion of this world
distance is always maintained
pretense is always preserved
in this worst waking place
there is no place to run
except back to sleep
in search of a better waking.
there’s no place to run
except back to sleep where they can’t look at my papers,
search and confiscate the simple parts of myself
the parts that show
parts they say don’t ring true
because I am not a bell, a homogenous object
vibrations do no travel across me unchanged
I am not pure metal, ripped from pure earth
refined, forged, beaten smooth
smooth touch, smooth sound, smooth talk about smooth gods
makes the feel all of a piece
I am a child of rougher gods
I cut their fingers and make them bleed
grinding crunch
becomes earthquake vibration
odd harmonics cascade
as I collide with this world where I wake up
alarm clock bell
drags me into clattering hum of this sleep waking drone
there is no place to run
except back to sleep
in search of a better waking, better place
though no place rings any more true to me than I do to
guards, soldiers, police
they can see, hear, feel it right down to their boots
dark skinned women
who don’t say the words the boys yell, MARICON
but think it
as they pull their children closer, away down the aisle
pale skinned women push their lips together even more tightly
stare right through me
boys, man-boys still sweating from the gym
wait in the check-out line
bulging bodies make the motion of elbowing me out of the way
they are standing still
breathing hard
impatient waiting
as the cashier addresses me by two different pronouns in the same sentence
calls me ma’am and sir before handing me my change
my leave to go out
home
up the hill
door slam
there is no place to run
except back to sleep
when this world is a swimming silver mirage
I can see right through it all
clear through to nothing
not like other spheres
that look surreal, like paintings
but are solid if I touch them
everything bends away from me here
so that I can never connect
the illusion of my anti-gravity bends the illusion of this world
distance is always maintained
pretense is always preserved
in this worst waking place
there is no place to run
except back to sleep
in search of a better waking.
Wednesday, April 27, 2016
SPEEDING PAST THE I-40 EXIT TO BASCUM HE BEGINS TO THINK ABOUT TACKETT’S STATION AND WESTERN CIVILIZATION AND PEGGY HOOPER
By Miller Williams
Where the Woodrow Wilson School was once
Where the Woodrow Wilson School was once
squat blocks of pastel siding
slap back at the sun.
slap back at the sun.
Why should it be there? Who was Woodrow Wilson?
We had a Dodge. When we hit a chicken
we had chicken.
we had chicken.
Milton Tackett fixed tires and sold the rubbers
you had to have in your wallet
like a badge
You’re under arrest. Take off all your clothes.
you had to have in your wallet
like a badge
You’re under arrest. Take off all your clothes.
Milton gave a package of rubbers free
for any pair of panties.
When you told him her name and he believed you
you got a dozen.
No sir I said I guess not.
Well he said if I said
pussy I could have one anyway
for any pair of panties.
When you told him her name and he believed you
you got a dozen.
No sir I said I guess not.
Well he said if I said
pussy I could have one anyway
A woman off the Titanic
talked Sunday night.
She said that all she heard them play
was a waltz.
talked Sunday night.
She said that all she heard them play
was a waltz.
I bought a Nash
for 97 dollars.
Sunday afternoons
cotton rows running up to the road
flicked by like spokes.
The cropdusting plane put down its pattern
back and forth across the field
like a shuttle.
I was drunk on speed
and metaphor. The world
was a weaving machine.
for 97 dollars.
Sunday afternoons
cotton rows running up to the road
flicked by like spokes.
The cropdusting plane put down its pattern
back and forth across the field
like a shuttle.
I was drunk on speed
and metaphor. The world
was a weaving machine.
But on the other hand
said Alexander the Great
bringing down the sword on the Gordian knot
fuck fate
said Alexander the Great
bringing down the sword on the Gordian knot
fuck fate
Didn’t you used to live here?
Don’t do that you’re going to tear something
Look if I take off my clothes will it make you happy
Look if I take off my clothes will it make you happy
I’m sorry. What did you say?
Nothing. Never mind.
Monday, April 25, 2016
Order
By Rachel Barenblat
Breakfast on kosher macaroons and Diet Pepsi
in the car on the way to Price Chopper for lamb.
Peel five pounds of onions and let the Cuisinart
shred them while you push them down and weep.
Call your mother because you know she’s preparing
too, because you want to ask again whether she cooks
matzah balls in salted water or broth, because you can.
Crumble boullion cubes like clumps of wet sand.
Remember the precise mixing order, beating
then stirring then folding, so that for one moment
you can become your grandfather.
Remember the year he taught you this trick,
not the year his wife died scant weeks before seder
and he was already befuddled when you came home.
Realize that no matter how many you buy
there are never quite enough eggs at Pesach
especially if you need twelve for the kugel
and eighteen for the kneidlach and another dozen
to hardboil and dip in bowls of stylized tears.
Know you are free! What loss. What rejoicing.
Breakfast on kosher macaroons and Diet Pepsi
in the car on the way to Price Chopper for lamb.
Peel five pounds of onions and let the Cuisinart
shred them while you push them down and weep.
Call your mother because you know she’s preparing
too, because you want to ask again whether she cooks
matzah balls in salted water or broth, because you can.
Crumble boullion cubes like clumps of wet sand.
Remember the precise mixing order, beating
then stirring then folding, so that for one moment
you can become your grandfather.
Remember the year he taught you this trick,
not the year his wife died scant weeks before seder
and he was already befuddled when you came home.
Realize that no matter how many you buy
there are never quite enough eggs at Pesach
especially if you need twelve for the kugel
and eighteen for the kneidlach and another dozen
to hardboil and dip in bowls of stylized tears.
Know you are free! What loss. What rejoicing.