Yes, there will be a Zoom reading and discussion this Saturday. Click on the link below at the appointed time to join.
Poetry Reading and Discussion, Sat. Apr. 27 2:00 PM PDT
To Join by Phone: (669) 444-9171
Meeting ID: 851 7583 0467
Passcode: 856528
I want to do homage this week to the poetry of Lucille Clifton. She is a striking poet whose work has an edge of spirit and fun, while treating deep topics with weight and intensity. These poems were chosen by our friend Melanie Perish, and they’re all so strong I couldn’t choose among them.
homage to my hips these hips are big hips they need space to move around in. they don't fit into little petty places. these hips are free hips. they don't like to be held back. these hips have never been enslaved, they go where they want to go they do what they want to do. these hips are mighty hips. these hips are magic hips. i have known them to put a spell on a man and spin him like a top! ~ jasper texas 1998 for j. byrd i am a man's head hunched in the road. i was chosen to speak by the members of my body. the arm as it pulled away pointed toward me, the hand opened once and was gone. why and why and why should i call a white man brother? who is the human in this place, the thing that is dragged or the dragger? what does my daughter say? the sun is a blister overhead. if i were alive i could not bear it. the townsfolk sing we shall overcome while hope bleeds slowly from my mouth into the dirt that covers us all. i am done with this dust. i am done. ~ "oh antic God" oh antic God return to me my mother in her thirties leaned across the front porch the huge pillow of her breasts pressing against the rail summoning me in for bed. I am almost the dead woman’s age times two. I can barely recall her song the scent of her hands though her wild hair scratches my dreams at night. return to me, oh Lord of then and now, my mother’s calling, her young voice humming my name. ~ note, passed to superman sweet jesus, superman, if i had seen you dressed in your blue suit i would have known you. maybe that choirboy clark can stand around listening to stories but not you, not with metropolis to save and every crook in town filthy with kryptonite. lord, man of steel, i understand the cape, the leggings, the whole ball of wax. you can trust me, there is no planet stranger than the one i’m from. ~ won’t you celebrate with me won’t you celebrate with me what i have shaped into a kind of life? i had no model. born in babylon both nonwhite and woman what did i see to be except myself? i made it up here on this bridge between starshine and clay, my one hand holding tight my other hand; come celebrate with me that everyday something has tried to kill me and has failed. ~ blessing the boats (at St. Mary's) may the tide that is entering even now the lip of our understanding carry you out beyond the face of fear may you kiss the wind then turn from it certain that it will love your back may you open your eyes to water water waving forever and may you in your innocence sail through this to that ~ the river between us in the river that your father fished my father was baptized. it was their hunger that defined them, one, a man who knew he could feed himself if it all came down, the other a man who knew he needed help. this is about more than color. it is about how we learn to see ourselves. it is about geography and memory. it is about being poor people in america. it is about my father and yours and you and me and the river that is between us. ~ The weight, the density of feeling in these poems is overpowering. The poem to her mother I find a haunting combinations of love, memory, and knowledge of aging. The ways the poems focus on how we see ourselves, in contexts personal and cultural, in failure and beyond. This topic, how we see ourselves, is great for poetry-- amazingly subtle, complex, yet powerful--and so capable of moving the heart in huge leaps. Take whichever poem suits you as an outline and fill it with your thoughts and feelings. Don't be surprised if you have to write a long poem, then cut it back to essentials. Bring the poem to the reading. Or just bring whatever you’re reading or writing. Hope to see you at Poetry! These events are sponsored by Nevada Humanities and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Thank you!
Bruce Isaacson Poetry Promise, Inc. a 501 (c)(3) Corporation Phone: (702) 205-7100 Bruce@PoetryPromise.org