Hello all,
I’m so thrilled that two of my poems are published in Issue Five of Recenter Press, edited by Terra Oliviera (whose Substack is amazing and you should definitely subscribe!)
Although it’s the first Sunday and thus usually a post I reserve for favorite-new-to-me films viewed in the last month, I’m going to push this to next week. This summer was a tough one and there’s something about poetry that is singularly able to help the human being feel the human being feelings. So I am sharing the two recently published poems here, and also including a few other poems that inspired me over this chaotic, sad, and frequently quite cruel summer.
Both poems are ones I’ve written long ago, but have (gently) edited over the years, and I’m glad they found a good home. Somehow they feel like they both speak to something at the very core of my being.
Souvenirs
There is the one-morning surprise of Odessan snails,
the refusal of watermelons, that word America and how dry
and confounding it tastes in my mouth.
In my uncle’s garden I smell potatoes being reaped
and clutch onto grandmother sleepily,
apron-cheeked and fading slowly.
Here the line for radioactive milk is long and spiderly;
it holds an iota of an ion isotope
in breast, in lung, in neck, and hair.
Of all else I am unafraid,
even Baba Yaga
hiding chicken-footed in the forest.
Of course, I have never seen the forest,
only Kiev—its blossoming lilacs,
strawberry balconies,
sun-mottled dirt.
The New Romantic Speaks
Let us beat our hearts
against rusted dumpsters
Let us read meaning
in the cracks of alleyways
Let us plunge forth
into silver cities
Let us give ourselves over
to the spinning earth
Let us be led by our noses
like wolves
Let us cover our faces
with the dust of the road
And now, some new favorites:
Paul Celan
(translation by Michael Hamburger)
Audre Lorde
Conversation in Crisis
I speak to you as a friend speaks
or a true lover
not out of friendship or love
but for a clear meeting
of self upon self
in sight of our hearth
but without fire.
I cherish your words that ring
like late summer thunders
to sing without octave
and fade, having spoken the season.
But I hear the false heat of this voice
as it dries up the sides of your words
coaxing melodies from your tongue
and this curled music is treason.
Must I die in your fever
as the flames wax take cover
in your heart's culverts
crouched like a stranger
under the scorched leaves
of your other burnt loves
until the storm passes over?
Maurya Kerr
give
give verb. (past gave; past participle given; gerund giving)
1 a — transfer the possession of something to someone: It costs a birth mother nothing to give up her baby for adoption. b — hand over to: She was given an epidural prior, sips of water during, papers to sign after. | Her father always said, with a snigger, give a nigger an inch and he’ll take a mile, give ‘em enough rope and they’ll hang ‘emselves. c — pay: Adoptive parents must give large sums of money to adopt a newborn, with prices varying according to its racial composition. d — used to express intense desire (hyperbolic): She’d have given her eyeteeth to be loved by him. e — entrust: She gave the baby into the care of strangers. f — sacrifice for a purpose: She gave the baby into the care of strangers. h — consent to have sex with (someone): Although her parents assumed otherwise, she had given and would have kept giving herself freely to him every dusking night, every dawning morning. (When he told her he wanted them to make love, at first she demurred and just gave him head, but soon enough gave herself up to pleasure, to abandon.) 2 a —cause to have: Her growing belly gave her pause, wonder, and sorrow (at times giving way to rage). b — bestow: She secretly gave the baby a name, telling not one single soul. | Her father had gone out of his way to get that nigger boy out of the ghetto and give him an education, and this is how he repaid him? | Her parents had given her everything, and this is how she repaid them? But they also secretly, separately wondered, her father, after drinking (which, unwilling to give up alcohol would soon enough lead his heart to give out), if maybe he had given her too much leeway; her mother, after reciting the rosary, if maybe she hadn’t given her enough love. | Her older brother said if she brought that black bastard baby home and gave it the family name he would disown her. | It became more and more difficult to give thanks to God. | In time, the newborn was baptized and given a name by her new family. c — assign a score to: He said that for a white girl she was pretty good in bed (gave as good as she got), gave her a seven out of ten. d — allow a specific amount of time for: She was given three days to sign the papers. | Do not give the new unwed mother occasion to nurse [archaic, to give suck] the newborn. e — pass on: Her father told her that niggers would give you cooties if you touched, swam in a pool, or ate with them. (And that fucking them would give rise to a monster. She gave a sigh of relief when she saw the baby, its beauty.) f — communicate to: She wished to give the baby a message of some kind, something to hold on to, the most secret of secrets two beings could have, but didn’t know what to say. 3 a — utter a sound: She gave one keening sob as the door closed (and was flooded with misgivings). b — present an appearance of: When she told him she was pregnant he quietly nodded, but later, when she told him that she loved him he became silent, giving no sign of reception or reciprocation. 4 emit an odor, vapor, or something intangible: He gave off a different kind of heat than any of the other boys she knew. 5 a — pledge: He had given her his word, but it turned out that words, in the heat of flesh and sin, were touch-and-go. (She waited for him, but soon enough gave up. It wasn’t until decades later that she
would burn all his letters. It wasn’t until decades later that she would realize there would be no getting over giving birth only to give the baby away.) b — say as an inappropriate response: And that boy had the audacity to give a white man sass. 6 reveal something: She stayed at home until her body began to give her secret away, at which point her parents sent her away. (The younger siblings weren’t told the truth until long after the baby was long gone and given away; some were never told.) 7 yield: She gave in to the pressure to bear down. | She gave in to the pressure (to give the baby up). | The baby was not one to give up. (Nor was she given to bouts of crying; once she
realized she was on dry land and alone, she became quiet, giving no further trouble.)
Noah Berlatsky
Community
(also from Issue 5 from Recenter Press!)
The herdsman frolic
white and fluffy like cloud cover.
But there are no clouds.
Only the sun, with its mild eye
burning, endlessly burning
as the blackbirds
ignite, and the pines sway
into flame, the children
climbing with buttery hands
into the great maw of heaven.
where the left lid opens
smooth as a wound.
The land is a chorus
of organic melody
beautiful, endless, silent
each fit for its place in the earth
under heaven, which turns
under no heart but its own.
Lora Mathis
Sleepless Years
(also from Issue 5 from Recenter Press!)
It’s the way you realize how tired you are once you finally
sit down for the day
How you go to sleep tired,
wake up tired, imagining
someday your bones will suck
in the harsh exhaustion and solve it
You look out into your restless years,
and see yourself bumping into windows,
trying to find a place to retreat
A way of being is ending
Through this door is another way
Tolu Ogunlesi
Home
(also from Issue 5 from Recenter Press!)
"There’s going to come a time when you can’t go home... The house will be there, the people in the house won’t be there." — Lionel Richie Sr.
We always have to do a leaving.
Slow change of clothes, followed
By forgetting what naked means.
The passing of years, a commute
Between prisons: here, high walls
Too familiar; there, not present enough.
Like a continent stringing itself
Between bottomless gulps of ocean.
We fall asleep, alarm-less, in one bed,
Wake up in another, where the light
Patterns the pillows differently.
No time to figure things out,
Only enough to pack for the return
Journey, back to where it all began.
this last one is a little cutesy but I thought it would be nice to leave this Substack post on a little more hopeful note:
Wendy Cope
The Orange
At lunchtime I bought a huge orange—
The size of it made us all laugh.
I peeled it and shared it with Robert and Dave—
They got quarters and I had a half.
And that orange, it made me so happy,
As ordinary things often do
Just lately. The shopping. A walk in the park.
This is peace and contentment. It’s new.
The rest of the day was quite easy.
I did all the jobs on my list
And enjoyed them and had some time over.
I love you. I’m glad I exist.
Until next time xx
