Poets Respond

June 2, 2024

“Anti-Aubade” by David RosenthalPosted by

David Rosenthal

ANTI-AUBADE

You shuffle through your waking house as though
the miracle of dawn does not deserve
acknowledgement, as though the way you go
downstairs, through doorways in the dark, and swerve
around the furniture, is nothing more
than habit, as if comfort doesn’t guide
your feet across the heated hardwood floor.
Your stomach turns at stirs of life outside.
You’re bracing for the dread of this new week,
though really you don’t know a dreadful thing.
You scroll through lifting darkness. What you seek
is anybody’s guess. The song you sing
turns out to be appropriated blues,
and genocides are other people’s news.
 

—from Poets Respond

__________

David Rosenthal: “I write early in the morning, so I tend to write about the dawn a lot. I also get most of my news in the early morning, scrolling through news outlets and social media. Those two elements of my morning routine intersect in this poem.”

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May 26, 2024

“Ode to the Cop Next to the One with the Pepper Spray” by Ryan McCartyPosted by

Ryan McCarty

ODE TO THE COP NEXT TO THE ONE WITH THE PEPPER SPRAY

Your cheek turns, Christ-like
from your buddy with the buddha
belly blowing chemicals
on crowds of my students. One falls
facedown while her own mucus
and sweat bottlenecks in the rush
to exit every hole she has. You
might or might not know the blind
terror of drowning, the lung-torn
scream that almost always does
the trick eventually, boosted by the guts
heaving underneath, till air breaks
through. Ten seconds, not like Floyd,
but enough to feel your mother
pounding inside your skull,
calling for you this time, to forget the grass
hasn’t always mixed with gravel
on your knees and palms in a prayer
of almost-dying. Officer, you know
the straight-backed virtue
of duty, eyes cast to the horizon,
white vapors spreading
to the morning. You avoid the sight
of a baseball cap skirting the fog,
kneeling, eyes on your chin, helping
the retching shoulders rise.
I’ll buy you a beer. Let’s rewind
and rewatch on half-speed, wait
for one foot to stir, one hand to drop
the pose. Never. You never break.
While we play you again and again,
you can explain, for all of us
non-heroes, how to hold the line, to pity
the spastic terrified flapping
of robins, escaping their trees in the choke
your boy backhands into the crowd,
how to see the birds disperse
when sense commands, how to look
away from a body and really believe.
 

—from Poets Respond

__________

Ryan McCarty: “I keep rewatching this video of University of Michigan campus police pepper spraying a crowd of my students, colleagues, friends, and community members. Most of my life (but especially the last dozen years or so) have been spent watching the cops who are doing the beating, the spraying, the kneeling, the dragging. But this time I can’t stop looking at one cop near the pepper sprayer. They’re looking upward, toward the east and some trees where I know hundreds of birds nest, and the sun had just risen. Can poetry help us understand that moment? Can anything?” (web)

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May 19, 2024

“Close Call” by Christine PotterPosted by

Christine Potter

CLOSE CALL

I’m still not sure I really saw the car—shiny red
on a day that was a long green nap—go airborne.
 
I saw the utility pole it had hit tremble—testing
itself against electric wires that couldn’t catch it—
 
and fall. But the car was surely on its roof and
beyond it the reservoir was lovely as that word’s
 
sound, and full of springtime rain. And past that,
long suburban lawns, eighty different shades of
 
green, green that owned itself so proudly you’d
need a Geiger counter to say how green: crazy, a
 
neon green, Kelly green, green like tomato vines
about to blossom and bear fruit. So I called 911.
 
My husband got us parked and ran across the
street to the kid in the upside-down red car, who
 
we both thought must be dead. And who seemed
profoundly still but moved his hands to put them
 
both over his face. It was raining again by then,
tiny drops you couldn’t see, and there were wires
 
down on the wet pavement. The cop who helped
the kid stand up and walk to the ambulance that
 
arrived told us he heard those wires singing. We’d
known they must be live. I’m old, my husband too.
 
The measure of our lives stretches out like a silly
accordion. We understand any number of dangers,
 
often read the papers to find out about them. We
step carefully in these day-long dusks, this sugary,
 
constant May rain. But I think our country is still
a garden. Look, irises snap their purple fingers on
 
creek banks; somehow, kids flip their cars and live.
And somehow the wires are still singing with news.
 

—from Poets Respond
May 19, 2024

__________

Christine Potter: “I have been especially disheartened by the news lately—and it’s hard to pin it down to just one story. The war in Ukraine is going poorly. But the New York Times Magazine story about extremist Israeli settlers twisted my gut the hardest; I’m a New Yorker with lots of Jewish friends, and I used to work for a school with a branch in Tel Aviv. I love Jewish people, but I see the brutal actions of the far-right Israeli government echoed in the far right here in America, who I fear would be equally violent, given the chance. I support the kids protesting on college campuses but worry about the consequences on the Presidential election in the fall. And then yesterday, my husband and I were driving to the local bakery when we ended up about half a minute behind a young man flipping his car. But everyone survived! I believe in American democracy more than most things. I hope for the best for my country, too.” (web)

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May 12, 2024

“Mother’s Day Unsonnet” by Dante Di StefanoPosted by

Dante Di Stefano

MOTHER’S DAY UNSONNET

To think that I was once a germ of light
in the belly of another being,
and that this fact is unremarkable
in the vast plod of human existence,
 
renders me heavy with the headiness
of so much unsaying, and to reflect
on the fact that it’s difficult to praise,
in a single sentence sonnet, the guise
 
of that first miraculous animal
the new animal of my own body
was once tethered to by a cord of
 
meat and need, and how by snipping this tie
a deeper chord sounded from the organ
of my own mouth, my first sacred wailing,
 
and how the world splits open every time
a son tries to tell his mother simply:
thank you for this one strange and shining life.
 

—from Poets Respond
May 12, 2024

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Dante Di Stefano: “My mother is an exceptional woman, who has done more for me than anyone. And yet, for some reason, I find it difficult to write poems for her. This poem started as an attempt to write a single sentence sonnet like Frost’s ‘The Silken Tent,’ only for my mom. Hopefully, it gets at some of the unbounded gratitude I feel for her and have a hard time articulating on the page and in every day life. Also, I hope it expresses my profound reverence for all mothers, and my gratitude to my wife for being such a great mother to our two children.”

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May 5, 2024

“I Reached Out and Am Awaiting a Response” by John ArthurPosted by

John Arthur

I REACHED OUT AND AM AWAITING A RESPONSE

I’m the Lebron James
of local bureaucrats.
Give me a project
and I’ll manage it
step by step like a PMP
using the waterfall method.
I’m shooting eighty-three
percent with these
crumpled up reports,
my desk as a backboard
for this waste paper basket.
I’ve got ninety-nine
passwords stored in
my head and I can
estimate the total
square footage of a building
with just one glance.
I rotate the same
two pairs of pants.
And once per year
when I go to France
I refuse to check
my email. Someone else
can pick up the refuse.
I’m just eating snails
and strolling Montmarte
buying street art
which I’ll hang
from the walls
of my cubicle in city hall
hoping someone will ask
where I found it
but no one ever does
and look, it’s not that
I’m trying to stall
it’s just for each decision
I’ve gotta call
a committee. This shit
is still a democracy
even when the ballots
are clouded with Meta’s
pixelated prop gun smoke
and I denote
I shall not poke
the sleeping commissioner
who right now is bumbling
through a speech
written by a Rutgers
college intern who uses AI
to craft policy briefs
in their briefs and listen,
everyone knows New Jersey
spends the most
per square mile
on repaving its roads.
Pot holes like pock marks
on my face. With legal pot
to fill any shortfalls
in our budgets
which barely budge
even when everyone’s
taxes go up
faster than a luxury
apartment complex.
And before nodding
out I hear your voice
again and again saying
Yes, please hold,
I’ll transfer you now.
 

—from Poets Respond
May 5, 2024

__________

John Arthur: “The Lakers lost in the NBA playoffs and my news feeds have been inundated with debate over whether Lebron James is the greatest basketball player of all time or whether it’s Michael Jordan. That prompted the ‘I’m the Lebron James of local bureaucrats’ opening, and the rest of the poem just came out basically as is. By the way, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is the greatest of all time.”

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April 28, 2024

“[translate me render me into the martian tongue …]” by Dmitry BlizniukPosted by

Dmitry Blizniuk

* * *

translate me render me into the martian tongue
across the black night
where the gun stock reaches the star.
beheaded houses hum in the gloom.
the neck vertebra of the torn staircases are exposed.
moonlight is bitter like the sap of killwort.
Lord translate my words.
we have not been born yet, but died already.
the evil sorcerer in his bunker gave the order
to annihilate all Ukrainians.
to burn all forms of memory. of life.
he poured a bucketful of flash drives into a bonfire.
our days are melting in the flames.
masses of memories of the universe.
 
I was young and once in a village I went diving
into the river after a running start.
rebar rods stood hidden underwater.
sharp rusted spikes.
the wooden fishing dock rotted away long ago.
for hours I chucked myself into the black river.
in the morning girl look here—you are covered with scratches.
on the legs, stomach, arms.
I was insanely lucky back then.
will I be lucky this day?
 
readers-refugees.
we pick the books off the shelves and knock
at every book’s cover. the classics.
let us into your paper worlds.
ray bradbury, sholokhov, leo tolstoy.
but no matter where I poke, it’s all For Thee the Bell Tolls.
I end up in War and insane Peace.
in Slaughterhouse-Number.
now the reality of our life is
Valley of the Red Data Book.
now every city is served
the cocktail Bloody Vlad.
crimson yolks float in dense murk
over the booze of events.
bombs gnaw at houses, schools, kindergartens, hospitals,
churches.
we are being freed of freedom and of lives.
the howling of sirens glides foreboding
air raid alarm—here comes flying
a purple swan with his head ripped away.
 
the dawn—a gray-blue
bigheaded infant resembling a shrimp.
labored breathing. pneumonia.
because of nights in a basement
a baby bird of mucus made its nest in the lungs.
yet another artillery barrage.
a rocket blasted an apartment in a skyscraper. a conflagration.
devil’s retrospective.
mom and the elder sister in the kitchen
are killed instantly by the explosion.
black thick smoke pours out of the corridor. billows.
burns a child’s eyes.
it’s not smoke-like, but black cotton candy.
the cat named Buttercup
is the first to tumble down to the asphalt
from the seventh-story window ledge.
thirteen-year old Misha follows him, leaps like a kitten
onto the enormous spire poplar—
planted three meters away from the balcony.
dry, slender branches break beneath the small body.
crackle.
it’s as if he is falling into an empty well,
inside it
sprouts a stinging biting tree.
the boy Misha finds a way
to snag his elbow on a thick branch
at the third-story level.
his ribs and left wrist are broken, but he’s alive.
he faints. translated, rendered safe.
 
people in the apartments.
butterflies under broken glass panes—
apollo, sailor. swallowtail, morpho menelaus—
with shrapnel-pins in their velvety backs
slowly, slowly
they lift off from the earth.
they rise together with the cement boxes.
but that’s impossible.
the butterfly collector is surprised.
how many more people will perish,
how many more worlds will vanish unexplored,
unnoticed. just like that.
by the sorcerous wish of the kremlin maniac.
 
Kharkiv 451.
two fire engines are already on the way.
carving corners an ambulance arrives at the entrance.
imperturbable medical angels.
dark-red scrubs. kevlars.
next to the car the cat
drags his back paws. crawls
towards the poplar. lifts his snout. screams horribly.
and the ambulance driver notices stuck in the crown
a child.
no stranger will save the people
the close ones and the distant ones
except us ourselves.
that’s why the boy Misha absolutely must survive.
that’s why we will win.
 
Translated from Russian by Yana Kane, edited by Bruce Esrig
 

—from Poets Respond
April 28, 2024

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Note from the translator Yana Kane: “Week after week, month after month, year after year I hear about Russia’s relentless attacks on Ukraine. Kharkiv is the city that has been subjected to especially vicious bombings. Yet each time the citizens of Ukraine, the citizens of Kharkiv respond with resilience and courage; each time they push back the darkness with their love of life. One of the ways I express my solidarity with them is by translating contemporary poetry written by Ukrainian authors. Dmitry Blizniuk is a Kharkiv poet who chronicles his city’s suffering and the indomitable spirit. Note that ‘we are being freed of freedom and our lives’ is a reference to Putin’s claim that he started the war in order to defend the Russian-speaking population of Ukraine against the discrimination by the Ukrainian government.”

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April 21, 2024

“What to Do if You’re Barely Scraping By” by Chera HammonsPosted by

Chera Hammons

WHAT TO DO IF YOU’RE BARELY SCRAPING BY

Have you tried paying down the balances of your debts?
That’s always the first step to financial freedom.
Have you tried having a savings account?
Here’s what you do. Start by saving a penny,
then double what you save every day.
On the second day, set two pennies aside.
On the third day, four. Soon you’ll have
pennies coming out your ears.
Have you tried making more money?
Have you tried filling out online surveys in your spare time?
Have you tried changing your career?
If none of these work for you, there’s always
something you have right now
that you could live without.
Have you tried living in your car?
You’ll save on rent. Have you tried
not having a car? You’ll save on maintenance.
Have you tried not having a cell phone?
Connection is a luxury. Have you tried giving up
your daily latte? Oh, you don’t have
a daily latte? In that case, have you tried
not eating out, or in, or around?
But don’t forget the importance of self-care. Stress
is a killer. Have you tried yoga?
Have you tried not being depressed?
Have you tried growing an insulating undercoat
and becoming an animal?
Have you tried running soundlessly
through the forest unclothed,
drinking from chilly mountain streams
and startling at sudden noises?
Have you tried lying softly on a bed of moss?
Have you tried needing nothing,
except what the world gives to you?
 

—from Poets Respond
April 21, 2024

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Chera Hammons: “This week I read that two-thirds of baby boomers, the wealthiest generation, don’t have enough saved for retirement as they reach retirement age (with a quarter having no savings at all). I also saw a story about people who have lost their entire life savings to a wire transfer scam, with no recourse available to them. My internet browser keeps recommending an article to me titled, ‘What to Do if You’re Barely Scraping By Financially.’ These things made me think of all the financial advice I’ve heard before, how it’s so often completely out of touch with reality.” (web)

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