A few poems for sheltering in place during Poetry Month

~
. . .  And
I am an enemy
of change, as
you know.  All
the things I
embrace as new
are in
fact old things,
re-released: swimming,
the sensation of
being dirty in
body and mind
summer as a
time to do
nothing and make
no money.  Prayer
as a last re-
sort.  Pleasure
as a means,
and then a
means again
with no ends
in sight. . . .

--From "Peanut Butter," a poem by Eileen Myles, from her book Not Me (Semiotext(e), 1991).  This poem was recently featured on the Ploughshares blog in a post called "Three Poems of Ordinary Exuberance for Uncertain Times," an essay by Ariel Katz (March 18, 2020). 


I have this, and this isn’t a mouth
       full of the names of odd flowers

I’ve grown in secret.
       I know none of these by name

but have this garden now,
       and pastel somethings bloom

near the others and others.
       I have this trowel, these overalls,

this ridiculous hat now.
       This isn’t a lung full of air.

--From "I Have This Way of Being," a poem by Jamaal May (2016).

An older woman in full traditional Palestinian embroidered dress, just
like my grandma wore, was crumpled to the floor, wailing.  "Help,"
said the flight agent.  "Talk to her.  What is her problem?  We
told her the flight was going to be late and she did this."

I stooped to put my arm around the woman and spoke haltingly.
"Shu-dow-a, Shu-bid-uck Habibti?  Stani schway, Min fadlick, Shu-bit-
se-wee?"  The minute she heard any words she knew, however poorly
used, she stopped crying.  She thought the flight had been cancelled
entirely.  She needed to be in El Paso for major medical treatment the
next day.  I said, "No, we’re fine, you'll get there, just later, who is
picking you up?  Let’s call him."

--From "Gate A-4," a poem by Naomi Shihab Nye, from her children's collection Honeybee (HarperCollins, 2008), pp. 162-164.


A man leaves the world 

and the streets he lived on 

grow a little shorter. 

One more window dark 

in this city, the figs on his branches 

will soften for birds.

--From "Streets," a poem by Naomi Shihab Nye, from her book Words Under the Words (Eighth Mountain Press, 1995).

It is December and we must be brave.

The ambulance’s rose of light
blooming against the window.
Its single siren-cry: Help me.
A silk-red shadow unbolting like water
through the orchard of her thigh.

--From "Manhattan Is a Lenape Word," a poem by Natalie Diaz, from her collection Postcolonial Love Poem (Graywolf Press, 2020).


First having read the book of myths,
and loaded the camera,
and checked the edge of the knife-blade,
I put on
the body-armor of black rubber
the absurd flippers
the grave and awkward mask.

--From "Diving into the Wreck," a poem by Adrienne Rich, from her book Diving into the Wreck: Poems 1971-1972 (W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1973).

The Spring 2020 issue of the Apple Valley Review

~

The Spring 2020 issue of the Apple Valley Review features poetry by Francesca Gargallo (translated from the Spanish by Dana Delibovi), Carol V. Davis, Robert L. Penick, Eric Stiefel, Trina Gaynon, Stan Sanvel Rubin, Débora Benacot (translated from the Spanish by Margaret Young), and Gail Peck; short fiction by Timothy Kenny; and a cover photograph from Brooklyn by Solomon Laker.  

The Apple Valley Review is a semiannual online literary journal. The current issue, previous issues, subscription information, and complete submission guidelines are available at www.applevalleyreview.com. 

Nonfiction by John Carreyrou, a graphic novel by Benjamin Reiss, and Jenny Offill's new novel

~
Bradley had worked with a lot of sophisticated medical technologies in the army, so he was curious to see the Theranos system in action.  However, he was surprised to learn that Theranos wasn't planning on putting any of its devices in the Pleasanton clinic.  Instead, it had stationed two phlebotomists there to draw blood, and the samples they collected were couriered across San Francisco Bay to Palo Alto for testing.  He also noticed that the phlebotomists were drawing blood from every employee twice, once with a lancet applied to the index finger and a second time the old-fashioned way with a hypodermic needle inserted in the arm.  Why the need for venipunctures--the medical term for needle draws--if the Theranos finger-stick technology was fully developed and ready to be rolled out to consumers, he wondered.   
--From Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup, a nonfiction account of the rise and fall of Theranos, by John Carreyrou (Alfred A. Knopf, 2018).  Carreyrou was a member of The Wall Street Journal's investigative reporting team when he initially broke this story.  The quote above is from page 112 of the hardcover edition of the book.

When I was in Japan, everyone kept asking me why I was there.  When I came back, everyone kept asking me what I did there for so long.  Always answering the same questions gets annoying.  
--From Super Tokyoland, a graphic novel by Benjamin Reiss (Top Shelf, 2017).  The first version of the graphic novel, called Tokyoland, was published in France in 2009.  The revised and extended version, Super Tokyoland, was first published in 2015, and was translated and published in English in 2017.  The book is also available for purchase from Penguin Random House.

My brother told me once that he missed drugs because they made the world stop calling to him.  Fair enough, I said.  We were at the supermarket.  All around us things tried to announce their true nature.  But their radiance was faint and fainter still beneath the terrible music.  
--From Weather, a novel by Jenny Offill (Alfred A. Knopf, 2020).

Short stories by Brian Crawford, Richard Berry, Emma Hunsinger, and Kim Chi-wŏn

~
A month later, someone started making small withdrawals from his account, from ATMs up and down Nevada.  The amounts were not material, and anyway it was his own money.  His wife had insisted they each keep separate financial lives.  "You never know what'll happen," she'd said, "and I always want to be able to make it on my own."

--From "Withdrawals," a story by Brian Crawford, Vestal Review, Issue 56 (January 2020).

A woman walks past my stall every afternoon in this spot at 4:15.

--From "The Crayfish Seller," a story by Richard Berry, 100 Word Story (July 2019).

1. Start with three shapes to form the neck, shoulders, and rump.
--From "How to Draw a Horse," an illustrated story by Emma Hunsinger, The New Yorker (December 30, 2019), pp. 40-49.  (Online it is in the section called Culture Desk.  In print, it was Sketchbook by Emma Hunsinger / May 30, 2019.  This graphic story appeared in the Cartoon Takeover issue.)

The young man usually dropped by the woman's West Side wine and spirit shop around 5 p.m. for a bottle of Almaden Chablis.  He came with the throng of rush-hour customers, and she didn't yet know him as one of the regulars.  She was still learning such basics as the shelf location and prices of the items, and although the man brought the same wine to the counter every time, she invariably had to check the price and look up the tax.  Some customers who stuck to one brand would tell her the price, but not this one.  
--From "Almaden," a short story by Kim Chi-wŏn.  It was published in the anthology The Future of Silence: Fiction by Korean Women, which was translated and edited by Bruce and Ju-Chan Fulton (Zephyr Press, 2016), pp. 25-32.

"Almaden" was my favorite story from this collection, but I particularly liked two other stories from The Future of Silence as well: "Dear Distant Love" by Sŏ Yŏng-ŭn (pp. 33-56) and "Identical Apartments" by Pak Wan-sŏ (pp. 57-78).

Poems by David Huddle and Jessica Greenbaum and novels by Jenny Offill and Wioletta Greg

~
When her Alzheimer's was just beginning, 
my mother had a suitor, a farmer
whose wife had died after a long illness, . . .  
--From "Aloft," a poem by David Huddle, The Southern Review, Volume 44:4 (Autumn 2008), pp. 780-782.  This poem was later reprinted in Blacksnake at the Family Reunion, a book of poems by David Huddle (LSU Press, 2012).

Driving into my old city yesterday
for the first visit in decades
every street sign whispered a story
from my only great war
my move here as a lone
21-year old, when by day three
my map of the city
lay shredded from reuse
and humidity and from
shaking it in hopes it would
rearrange into something familiar—
--From "Four a.m. and 40 Years Later, from an Eighteenth Floor Balcony, Downtown," a poem by Jessica Greenbaum, Plume, Issue 101 (January 2020).

One day God called the bat to him and gave him a basket to carry to the moon.  The basket was filled with darkness, but God didn't tell him what it was. . . .  The bat grew tired and stopped for a rest.  He put down the basket and went off to find something to eat.  While he was gone, other animals came along. . . .  The dogs and wolves tried to pull [the darkness] out and play with it, but it slipped away between their teeth and slithered off.  Just then, the bat returned.  He opened the basket and found it empty.  The other animals disappeared into the night.  The bat flew off to try to recapture the darkness.  He could see it everywhere, but he couldn't fit it back inside his basket, no matter how hard he tried.  And this is why the bat sleeps all day and flies all night.  He's still trying to catch the dark.
        "Which part of the story was the part about Africa?" I wanted to know.  I had asked my mother to tell me about Africa and instead she had told me about the bat.  "It's all about Africa," my mother said, frowning.  "Everything except the part about God."   
--From Last Things, a novel by Jenny Offill (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1999; Vintage Books/Random House, 2015).

I am nauseated by the odor of musty rugged jackets, wool, the tonics with which the women spritz their hair.  Sitting on my suitcase I stare out the window, where the sunlight disappears into the poplars like when water closes over a cuttlefish.  
        Suddenly I think I see, standing up near the front of the bus, my old acquaintance Kamil, with whom I fell in love over the summer and then lost contact.  That has to be him, I think, thrilled, squeezing myself and my suitcase towards him.
        "Is it really you?" I ask, excited, grasping his leather jacket.  
        "Course it's me, honeycakes," responds this stranger as he eyes me up and down.
--From Accommodations, a novel by Wioletta Grzegorzewska (writing as Wioletta Greg), translated from the Polish by Jennifer Croft (Transit Books, 2019). Originally published as Stancje (W.A.B.: Poland, 2017).  This is a follow-up to Swallowing Mercury, which is a beautiful, poetic little novel, also from Transit Books.

Novels by Wioletta Greg and Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir, and three poems from The Southern Review

~
A christening shawl decorated with periwinkle and yellowed asparagus fern hung in the window of our stone house for nearly two years.  It tempted me with a little rose tucked in its folds, and I would have used it as a blanket for my dolls, but my mother wouldn't let me go near it.
        "Don't touch the shawl, Loletka.  It's a memento.  We'll take it down when your dad comes back," she'd say.  And when her friend who lived nearby would pop in "for a moment"—meaning two hours—she would repeat the story of how, a month after my father was arrested for deserting from the army and two weeks before her baby was due, she received a summons to start a work placement at Cem-Build.  Together with a dozen other women, she had to make paving slabs as part of the new five-year plan, so that the district government could create new squares in front of office buildings, schools and health centres within the allotted time.  In the end, Mum couldn't take working outside in the freezing weather.  She hid behind a cement mixer, and when her waters broke into a bucket full of lime they drove her to the maternity ward.
        She brought me home in February.  Still bleeding after childbirth, she lay down on the bed, unwrapped my blanket, which reeked of mucus and urine, rubbed the stump of my umbilical cord with gentian violet, tied a red ribbon around my wrist to ward off evil spells and fell asleep for a few hours.  It was the sort of sleep during which a person decides whether to depart or to turn back.
--From Swallowing Mercury, a novel by Wioletta Grzegorzewska (writing as Wioletta Greg), translated from the Polish by Eliza Marciniak (Transit Books, 2017).  Originally published as Guguły, which means "unripe fruit" according to the translator's note at the end of the book (Wydawnictwo Czarne: Wołowcu, Poland, 2014).

A day so happy.
Fog lifted early, I worked in the garden.  
--From "Gift," a poem written and translated from Polish to English by Czeslaw Milosz, reprinted in "Regarding Happiness," an essay by Charles Baxter, The Southern Review, Volume 44:2 (Spring 2008), p. 248.

My old man rings me on my cell.  The garbage can is beside the road
and needs to be rolled back into the carport.  
--From "My Father's Garbage Can," a poem by David Bottoms, The Southern Review, Volume 44:2 (Spring 2008), p. 220.

Water opens without end
At the bow of the ship
--From "Voyage," a poem by Samuel Menashe, reprinted in "No Small Feat" by Robin Ekiss, a review of Samuel Menashe: New and Selected Poems (edited by Christopher Ricks), The Southern Review, Volume 44:2 (Spring 2008), p. 365.

On my way down Skothúsvegur I reflect on how one should go about borrowing a hunting rifle from a neighbour.  Does one borrow a weapon the same way one borrows a hose extension?  What animals are hunted at the beginning of May?  One can't shoot the messenger of spring, the golden plover, who has just returned to the island, or a duck hatching from an egg.  Could I say that I want to shoot a great black-backed gull that keeps me awake in the attic apartment of a residential block in the city centre?  Wouldn't Svanur find it suspicious if I were to suddenly turn into a spokesman for ducklings' rights?  Besides, Svanur knows that I'm no hunter.  
--From Hotel Silence, a novel by Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir, translated from the Icelandic by Brian FitzGibbon (Black Cat/Grove Atlantic, 2018).  Published by arrangement with Éditions Zulma, Paris, France.  Originally published as Ör (Scars) (Benedikt Bókaútgáfa: Reykjavík, Iceland, 2016).

Fiction by Alina Bronsky, Jean Thompson, and Ann Patchett, and two poems about fire

~
I'm awoken in the night again by Marja's rooster, Konstantin.  He's like an ersatz husband for Marja.  She raised him, and she pampered and spoiled him even as a chick; now he's full-grown and good for nothing.  Struts around the yard imperiously and leers at me.  His internal clock is messed up, always has been, though I don't think it has anything to do with the radiation.  You can't blame the radiation for every stupid thing in the world.  
--From Baba Dunja's Last Love, a novel by Alina Bronsky, translated from the German by Tim Mohr (Europa Editions, 2016).  Originally published as Baba Dunjas letzte Liebe (Kiepenheuer & Witsch: Köln, Germany, 2015).

My father came home from the war to a household of girls and women.  There was me, my mother, and my sister Carol, born while he was away.  This was 1967, which was early to be coming back from Vietnam.  More people were going there than returning, as is the case in any war.  And the great acceleration, the downhill plunge, was just beginning.  You have to remember none of us knew how anything would turn out.  
--From Who Do You Love, a collection of short stories by Jean Thompson (Harcourt Brace & Company, 1999).  It was published in paperback in 2000 by Simon & Schuster.  This excerpt is from "The Amish," a short story which was first published in American Short Fiction.

I was looking at a poster for Midnight Alarm when the first
        minivan blew up.  Ten minutes after the second explosion
        we heard the sirens, and I knew they didn't sound
the same as in the Garden in 1950, alerting firefighters
        laid out on cots as if asleep to rise and dowse a scaffolding 
        structure painted like a tenement or brownstone.
--From "Fire in the Streets," a poem by Gavin Adair, Mid-American Review, Volume 27, Number 1 (Fall 2006), p. 125.

. . .  Love's insects land on your arm 
& draw a little blood.  Instinctively, you squash them with your palm.
Amazing the seasonal shifts we permit ourselves: It seemed lucky 
when our apartment burned.  My father circumvented the superintendent 
& illegally installed a new invention: the air conditioner, overloading vintage wiring.

Next scene: a thousand people in exile, clutching (what would be the one
possession you'd snatch in a panic?), & we all watched, hypnotized by flames, 
like a scene from a '50s Godzilla movie, the lives of families transformed by my father's
desire for a comfortable summer. . . . 
--From "Unitarian Birds," a poem by Bruce Cohen, Mid-American Review, Volume 28 (Fall 2007), pp. 60-61.

The first time our father brought Andrea to the Dutch House, Sandy, our housekeeper, came to my sister's room and told us to come downstairs.  "Your father has a friend he wants you to meet," she said.
--From The Dutch House, a novel by Ann Patchett (HarperCollins, 2019).