Hands

/

For my paternal grandmother, Margaret.

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Muted

I cannot seem to translate the wordless words in my heart;

the young foals spill from their mother and walk in seconds; Continue reading

Progress versus Novelty

I have not seen the latest iPhone but

I’m sure it will be a little bit prettier

than the one before it and

the one before that. Continue reading

Itinerary

In that corner

a window fan

inhales frigid

air

in this corner

single-malt

catches

the ceiling fan’s perfect circle

over

a huddle of boxes

flowering open

into an unknown space

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Header image found here

Poem Exchange on Statues

I had an exchange with a friend several weeks ago on the tearing down of statues; we only wrote to one another, at first, in poems, and we wrote our poems in under an hour, so excuse us the flaws in our work. I offer it to you here as an interruption in programming, before the event recedes too much in the rearview mirror.

I am not an iconoclast, although I wholeheartedly endorse removing statues to Confederate generals and those whose purpose was wrapped up in the institution of slavery. This trend can, of course, go far past the original target. I feel this awkward need simultaneously to apologize for the poem and to explain it and even (at least in part) to justify it.

Here are the poems; I will say a few words of explanation after them. Continue reading