April in the rearview mirror

April – what a month. I ushered it in with my annual April 1 (bunny bunny) reading of T.S. Eliot’s “The Waste Land,” then spent almost the entire remainder of the month reading and listening (and reading and listening, and reading and listening) to Leonard Cohen’s last book, The Flame. At month’s end, I had read the tactile book twice and listened to it on CD at least four times, if not five (starting in March). It was worth every minute. In between, I got to see Andrea Gibson perform, and read a lot of other poetry by a wide range of authors. I read poetry every single day of April, and it was a blessing. I also wrote poetry every day, although not all of it got published here. Here are all the pieces that did. There also were pieces I started and am still working on, pieces I discarded, and little snippets that found life only on my Twitter stream. Case in point:

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A little e.e. cummings to end National Poetry Month

On the last day of National Poetry Month—today—I turned my attention finally away from Leonard Cohen and listened to a CD of e.e. cummings reading his own work. Undeterred by the fact that he was a pretty terrible reader (or this was one truly substandard performance), I was happily reminded how much I love his poem “somewhere i have never traveled, gladly beyond.” Continue reading

Chocolate angel food

I’ve never tried that chocolate angel food recipe
but each time I see it in my cookbook
I think of you

trailing Grandma Fay around her kitchen
writing down her every move
forcing her to measure ingredients
she could gauge by sight or feel
getting in her way
so you could replicate her result
transform the mediocrity of your own first effort
(
the mediocrity of her written recipe)
into the mouthmelt you knew this cake to be. Continue reading

Signs of longing

The scent of you still lingers on your pillow.
(I cannot bear to wash the case.)

The dog still sits by the door before dinner time,
ears up, eyes sparkling, mouth agape,
listening for the jingle of car keys
to tell her you’re home.

And I still remember that evening
when we walked out to the far end of the pier
and watched the sun go down,
the sky grow dark,
and a galaxy of stars emerge so bright
they could have lit our path home
even without the firefly show that accompanied them. Continue reading