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Day 10, Poet 10: Joelle Biele

4/10/2018

 
Picture

Postcard
Union Pacific Transfer Depot, Council Bluffs, Iowa
 
One day you wake up in a town you can’t name
and there’s no way to plot a path from A to B. 
You hear a train, then you don’t, the sound
 
bounces off the hills, gets trapped in a gulley
or skims a church spire only to scatter
over a silo that dreams of nothing but thunder
 
and grain. Who says the route is not the shortest distance
between two points, says it’s a branching river
and you must get in your little boat and paddle
 
down each grassy inlet and tiny stream—as if sets
of unreadable alphabets opening beneath your feet
and clambering over fence posts were a good thing?
 
I don’t want to come to the edge of myself, don’t
want that sinking towards a bottom that never seems
to come. Sometimes I’m held together with pins
 
and strings. I’m pieces of fabric, a dress waiting
to be seamed, or I’m the stitches ripped out, threads
blown across the floor. I want to lie on a cool, clean
 
sheet, feel it drape over my face, arch my back
like a cat, be reduced to nothing but bone,
the big wind that races across the field, bend
 
the trees back, push clouds, be shadow, whip past
blouses hanging on the line like women waiting
for their lives, all of it silver and into the sun.


Previously published in Tramp (LSU Press, 2018).

Joelle Biele is the author of Tramp and the editor of Elizabeth Bishop and The New Yorker: The Complete Correspondence.  A Fulbright professor in Germany and Poland, she is currently the Howard County Poetry and Literature Society’s Writer-in-Residence, doing writing workshops with Maryland high school students.

Day 9, Poet 9: Jason McCall

4/9/2018

 
Picture
Photo by David A. Smith
​Montgomery, 1998
​

Because this is Montgomery in 1998,
the first lessons I learn in 7th grade are I can’t
say nigger too loud and all students need
to wear t-shirts under their Barkley jerseys.


Because this is Montgomery in 1998,
I’m smart enough not to say nigger
too loud so my parents send me away
to the gifted school downtown.


Because this is Montgomery in 1998,
“gifted” means mostly white
kids who can’t fight
or can’t afford private school.


Because this is Montgomery in 1998,
my white friend in Latin won’t talk to me
about anything other than No Limit Records
and East Bay books.


Because this is Montgomery in 1998,
Most of my dreams end with a light-skinned girl’s legs
in English class. One or two dreams
will never leave the Latina who gave me my only nickname.


Because this is Montgomery in 1998,
the school year really doesn’t matter
because no one notices me stringing up
my Terrell Davis cross trainers on the first day.


Because this is Montgomery in 1998,
my grandmother dies
and I feel weak when I try to hold up
my fainting mom in church.


Because this is Montgomery in 1998,
my biggest failures are my failure to dunk
and my failure to raise
my eyebrow like The Rock.
​

Because this is Montgomery in 1998,
I’m the last kid at home, waiting for the hum
of a car in the driveway while I count all the ghosts
I want to be when I grow up.


​Previously published in Banango Street. 



Jason McCall has an MFA from the University of Miami. His collections include Two-Face God, Dear Hero, Silver, I Can Explain, and Mother, Less Child. He is co-editor of It Was Written: Poetry Inspired by Hip-Hop. He is an Alabama native, and he teaches at the University of North Alabama. 

Day 8, Poet 8: Lana Hechtman Ayers

4/8/2018

 
Picture

Red Riding Hood As Wild Child
 
I used to love to walk
in the woods in the rain.
Mother said it was because
I was a brainless child,
stupid and wild.
 
She was also fond of asking,
“Were you raised in a barn?”
And I kept wanting to answer, Yes
Mother, that makes you a cow,
but I knew to hold my tongue.
 
In my red cape, I was never cold.
I could go out in any storm
and be completely safe and warm.
Grandma made that cape with love
for sure, but it also seemed
 
sprinkled with a bit of fairy dust.
It was a magical sheath,
and I was lucky to be entrusted
with its power to make
others adore me when I wore it.
 
The showers of praise I received
made me feel special as I never had.
The hooded cape suited me, all
the neighbors said, these same folks
who never noticed me before.
 
But to my mother, I was still an ordinary
brat, the reason for everything wrong
in her life (like father leaving her
for a younger wife) and no coat
was ever going to change that.
 
Whenever I could arrange to sneak out,
I did—in rain, sleet, snow.
I tried to be discreet, shutting the creaky
back door, quick and crisp.
It was always a risk.
 
The front door was an impossibility.
Mother was usually passed out
drunk on the couch, but the slightest
rearrangement of a particle of dust,
and she’d be up and ranting.
 
“Red, get back here!” she’d scream.
“Scrub those pots till you
see God’s face in them.”
No matter how hard I polished, I never
saw anyone’s face in them but my own.


Previously published in Red Riding Hood's Real Life (Night Rain Press, 2017).


Lana Hechtman Ayers has authored nine collections of poetry and is about to release her first speculative novel—a time travel adventure. She manages three poetry presses and works as a manuscript consultant. Lana lives on the Oregon coast where she enjoys the near-constant plink of rain on the roof and the sea’s steady whoosh. 

Day 7, Poet 7: Kamari Bright

4/7/2018

 
Picture
Photo by Annie Graham Imagery.

Kamari

   One day, the Moon will love herself. She will no longer play second to sun. She will no longer be the
  reflection to another’s light. She will emanate tar black velvet over every living thing. In our blindness
we will feel her light, like evaporated honey on our skin. She will not pull travelers & tides & wombs to
                                                                                                                        her. She will not need their adoration.

When the moon loves herself one day she will not be able to hide her face. She will break orbit, other  
                                                                                                 moons in tow, and revolve in her own magnetism.

And they will wake up one day, the great grandchildren of my great-greats, with the sun in their eyes.
  And will blind themselves that morning & dread the emptiest night they will ever see, on the day the
                       moon loves herself. On that day, they will wonder why she ever loved them to begin with.




Previously published in NILVX: A Book of Magic, Vol. I Issue IV: Sphere of Luna.

Operating with the belief that everything she creates is intended to foster understanding of self and surroundings, Kamari Bright is a St. Louis-born writer who has had work featured in publications, included in exhibits, and released her first book through 7 Publishing in 2016.

Day 6, Poet 6: Christine Hemp

4/6/2018

 
Picture

The Tune of It
A response to Hailey Leithauser’s poem
 “Short, Sweet” for 32 Poems Magazine

 
Short, Sweet 

                       slips

                            down the sheet

                                          of white

                             space

like notes                             rising 
                dropping then 
        
sounds abound    repeat

                                        trippingly

seeingly

              upon the ear

                       slant  rhyme cambering

the iamb         (lifting)    into

                            slim-sweet fleetingness

                                                       (yes the tune of it)
 

​
Previously published in 32 Poems, with accompanying Celtic flute by Christine Hemp. 


Christine Hemp has read her poems and essays on NPR’s Morning Edition, and her awards include a Washington State Artist Trust Fellowship for Literature. A poem of hers traveled over 1.5 billion miles on a NASA mission to monitor the birth of stars. She is author of “That Fall.” Hemp also plays Celtic and jazz flute, often weaving poetry into her performances. A former art critic, she is drawn to writing poems from paintings and sculpture; one was featured recently at a Seattle gallery which paired writers with single pieces of art. Hemp teaches poetry and nonfiction at the University of Iowa Summer Writing Festival. She lives with her husband and horses in Port Townsend, Washington.

Day 5, Poet 5: Vandana Khanna

4/5/2018

 
Picture
Photo by Julia Dillon

Prayer to Recognize the Body
 
There must be a word for this
heart-growing, to explain these teeth,
 
stinging skin like a gift, tremble of
hair coaxed from sweat and scalp. 
 
The next thing I covet: the third eye’s
velvet blink, the green pulse in my veins
 
of a forest I can’t make myself step out of. 
And what of all the things remade, swabbed
 
free of salt?  Because who can tell
the difference in the dark between
 
antlers and branches and bone, between
the thick-haired chest of an animal and you.


Previously published in Passages North.

Born in New Delhi, India, Vandana Khanna is the author of two collections: Train to Agra and Afternoon Masala, as well as the chapbook, The Goddess Monologues. Her poems have won the Crab Orchard Review First Book Prize, The Miller Williams Arkansas Poetry Prize, and the Diode Editions Chapbook Competition.

Day 4, Poet 4: Tyler Tsay

4/4/2018

 
Picture

Substitutes For "Before My Father Was Diagnosed With Cancer"

*

they pushed a man 
into me 
when all 
i wanted 
was the sun
to rise

*

son, son,
let us 
build castles
& be castles
together-- 
i sit atop your shoulders
& stay there.

*

i do not
want children,
anyone that loves 
so unknowingly

*

they took the tumor 
that was 
your name 
& gave back 
to you 
so much less 
than you 
were owed

*

my father
a rageful wind

*

nowadays
pauses over
the phone remind
me i am losing you
from three
thousand miles away

*

by violence
come violence
by violence 
a son

*

son, son,
forgive
go on
show god
the good
in you still--
so i rebuild
& rebuild
what will 
never
stay mine

*

bad things
don't care
bad things
break the rules
dad
break the rules
& live

*

the birds sing
& in it,
your glorious laugh
your soft hands


Previously published in DIAGRAM.



Tyler Tsay is a student at Williams College and the Program Director of The Speakeasy Project (thespeakeasyproject.net). His work, both past and upcoming, has been or will be published in The Offing, The Margins: AAWW, BOAAT, Vinyl Poetry, DIAGRAM, Boxcar Poetry and others. He is the recipient of the Bullock Poetry Prize, awarded by the Academy of American Poets and judged by Camille Rankine, and the former Editor in Chief of The Blueshift Journal (theblueshiftjournal.com). When not doodling, collecting quills, or composing cello pieces, he loves a good view, though having an atrocious fear of heights. And yes, fezzes are definitely cool.

Day 3, Poet 3: Jenifer Browne Lawrence

4/3/2018

 
Picture

Candling
 
Say that it bloomed, put down roots, lodged
 
like an egg in a nest, snow in a cleft, wedged
for a winter’s nap, say it
 
turned three times round, curled up
with its nose toward the door.
 
Say myometrium. Say wand. Say gel,
neoplasm, adenoma. Say benign.
 
Benign.
 
Put a light bulb behind it and watch it
tumesce.
 
Say the raven is growing
a new planet in your body.
 
Should the nascent body bloom, say
is this the beak, that the beginning of legs.


First published in North American Review and later included in Jenifer's second poetry collection,Grayling.


Jenifer Browne Lawrence is the author of
 Grayling (Perugia Press, 2015), and One Hundred Steps from Shore (Blue Begonia Press, 2006). Her work appears in Bracken, The Coachella Review, Los Angeles Review, Narrative, North American Review,
 and elsewhere. She lives on Puget Sound, and edits the Seattle-based journal, Crab Creek Review. Say hi on twitter @jeniferbrowne. 

Day 2, Poet 2: Natasha Marin

4/2/2018

 
Picture
Photo by Daniel Carillo

​The Lesser Temple
 
Before the rain came, like a stampede of lakes,
I had climbed halfway down the mountain alone--

only the tremor of exhaled lullabies
could flatten the tympani of my chest.

We had interrupted nuns and monks
in the summit village midway through a meal.
 
My stance of guilt and his entitled stride.
Not holding hands, even when the barking dog,

charged with protecting such holiness,
kept teeth and relentless noise beside me.
 
I would end up crossing that same dog three more times
like an omen
 
as I had forgotten something precious
at the point where the green coupling gives way to the sky.

There where he had stopped to share a breathless cigarette with me.
There where I used two rusted bobby pins to become beautiful again for the photos.
 
I found my way to the top the second time, found the little plastic bag,
lingering where I had abandoned it to my excitement.

The foretelling. The chalking up.
The durations we entertained together and apart.

I could’ve slipped easily like a pickax finding blood through flesh,
like a scream finding absolution in the air,
 
sliding like broken angles off of the side of the mountain,
but still he didn’t follow me.
 
He was always convinced that my skin made me resilient.
I didn’t need protection.

I wasn’t graceful, I was strong.
I wasn’t fragile, couldn’t be.

But he could justify every maligning move with just a shrug.
Not me.

When I made it back to the holy village, full of flowers and flat paths,
the dog was there. But I had found a large stick in the jungle.

It was black with rot, but thick in my hand.
With each step toward the one who had led me here,

I hit the ground and held my head up.
The dog noted my accoutrement—the master I carved out of air.
 
Allowed me to pass. As I was only a heart beating--
I passed the stone temple, roped off, but filled with colorful offerings.

I ended up at the lesser temple.
Tile floor dipped concave like a swimming pool at the center.

And I made him wait,
while I acknowledged the majesty of the space I had allowed myself into.

The space of moot summation.  The space of makeshift rationale.
Let my eyes close for a moment.  And took a breath.
 
I hadn’t yet begun to cry because I hadn’t yet begun to feel sorry for myself.
That would come later.



Natasha Marin is a conceptual artist primarily engaged in the work of digital engagement and community building. Natasha's methodology pivots around co-creation and she uses platforms like Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook to find, connect, and build alliances among individuals and communities. Her work (often done in collaboration with non-artist-identified folks) supports building a creative legacy with sustainable communities through different levels of engagement, modes of connection, and methods of encounter. She is a recovering poet, author of Milk, creator of Reparations, #WomanCentered, Red Lineage, & Black Imagination.

Day 1, Poet 1: Alison Pelegrin

4/1/2018

 
Picture
Photo by Bryan Davidson
Hot Sauce Shrine
 
I used to be a high priestess of tail-feather feel-good
mumbo jumbo, naysayer extraordinaire
cobbling together some crazy quilt catechism
to cling to as I tangled in the world’s thorns,
frantic, fearing the chill soon to come.
I haven’t turned holy roller or handler of snakes,
but things changed slowly, or all at once.
Maybe it was when I drove through a dust devil
and inhaled its grit of cut grass and cigarette butts.
I’ve taken to praying since the whirlwind
shook me loose, or anyway I dip my head
at stoplights until I get distracted by scenery,
or birds, and the prayers come out confused.
I’m clueless--my angel of place smokes blunts
and speaks to me in bug bite braille. I know
to visit St. Roch and turn his statue to the wall,
but I hunger for alone time on an island
with an organ that plays itself, or to whisper
all my secrets to the hot sauce shrine.
I read that the world is a dream of God,
and now I don’t know what to do with my hands.
The world is God’s dream and I am a sparrow
passing through song and the brass glow of fire,
or maybe that is wrong, and I’m trapped inside,
stunned against the glass or down the chimney,
terrified of kind hands that sweep me to the door.
When I wake I’m walking the moonlit labyrinth
with wet feet, and the birds are quiet because
I have terrified them with the thunder
of my stumbling. Oh God of everything that creeps,
I light a candle and ask my question:
Is it pilgrimage enough if I spend my life
remembering the few seconds I was a bird?
 

Previously published in Waterlines (LSU Press 2016).

Alison Pelegrin is the author of four poetry collections, most recentlyWaterlines (LSU Press 2016), and Our Lady of the Flood (Diode Editions 2018) and a winner of the Diode chapbook prize. She is the recipient of fellowships from the Louisiana Division of the Arts and the NEA, and is on the graduate faculty at Southeastern Louisiana University. 

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