Here, the bodies of children. They died at dusk.Instead of bread, fed stones from the sling.Kept from shelter until their bodies stiffened.The sun failed to keep them warm.And she, the greatest sun, could not love them,because of the stones, because of the serpent.—translated from Waldo Williams’ “The Dead Children,” Volume 65, Issue . . .
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Late spring and early summer belongs to the delicate smell of lindens in bloom, covering the stench of violence and death in the city of Philadelphia. Every year, as the temperatures rise, so does the litany of guns at night, the refrain of a city intent on breaking your heart. Never enough branches and trunks . . .
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Winter was standing behind him.It imitated his shadowAnd considered itself a tree.It was getting skinny.It felt cold.You’re like a wooden coat hanger prepared to move home.The hat and the four assembled seasonsWouldn’t follow you.They would remain in paper boxes, deepIn their sleep, dreamless and naked.The cat would stay to guard the home.—from . . .
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Courtesy of Chris Buhalis If you’re gone for good—if you’re history –I’ll know to search along rivers.I’ll look for bones, trace foundations,piece old shapes from shards. But time will take those, too.Strangers arriving with children will runthe length of the ruins for hide-and-seek,squeals of living delight.—from “Always Beside a River,” Volume 65, . . .
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@josephbrodsky puts on a snuggly tune,tweets a few words: “December. Like counting spoonsin the sideboard after a guest is gone.”Grins on rereading:this is the perfect tone. Gets up, goes to the window, looks out. It strikeshim that the day, still young, has grown dusky. Likea snowflake that—having lived a second in flight,fragile, . . .
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You were a wooden coat hanger.Your body, half-clothed. No hat could alter your looks.No gentleman’s hat that tipped to highlightYour smile. You were an exquisite gentleman’sCoat hanger, with pale skinny arms growing upward. The wood grain was fading, paler and paler.The winter, too, was half-clothed. No gentleman’s hatCould disguise the looks of . . .
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On November 1, 2012—over ten years ago now—I awake to the sound of a generator . . . in another, wealthier building. It is Day Four of the blackout. I cover my nose from the chill in my unheated and lightless apartment. My husband, already awake, wraps his arms around me and . . .
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I’m home from work, reading in bed, when Mom calls to tell me. It’s six in the evening. My boyfriend’s out with some friends of his I find exhausting. He’s often out, while I stay in. We’ve been together for almost a decade, our rituals of avoidance calcified into habit. I live . . .
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1. CHLORIS HAS HER SAY “If it’s true, Chloris, that you love me,and I’ve heard you do love me well—”was a fresh way for you to begin.After that you lost the thread a bit,scorning ambrosia and the prospectof trading places with kings if my lovewere sure. (No kings were offering.)—from “Anti-Pastorals,” Volume . . .
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Before we brush our teeth and get dressed, beforeI take two kinds of blood pressure pills and threefiber gummies, put coffee in one kind of go-cup,kale smoothie in another, get into the car, I say I wantto have one more cup of coffee in bed and read youthis Ellen Bass poem, but it’s . . .
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