(Sunday April 20-Friday April 25)
This Life
by Grace Paley
by Grace Paley
My friend tells me
a man in my house jumped off the roof
the roof is the eighth floor of this
building
the roof door was locked how did he
manage?
his girlfriend had said goodbye I'm
leaving
he was 22
his mother and father were hurrying
at that very moment
from upstate to help him move out of
Brooklyn
they had heard about the girl
the people who usually look up
and call jump jump did not see him
the life savers who creep around the
back staircases
and reach the roof's edge just in time
never got their chance he
meant it he wanted
only one person to know
did he imagine that she would grieve
all her young life away tell everyone
this boy I kind of lived with last year
he died on account of me
my friend was not interested he said
you're always
inventing stuff what I want to know how
could he throw
his life away how do these guys do it
just like that and here I am fighting this
ferocious insane vindictive virus day
and
night day and night and for what? for
only
one thing this life this life
For his birthday, I gave Stanley a hyacinth bean,
an annual, so he wouldn't have to wait for the flowers.
He said, Mark, I have just the place for it!
as if he'd spent ninety-eight years
anticipating the arrival of this particular vine.
I thought poetry a brace against time,
the hours held up for study in a voice's cool saline,
but his allegiance is not to permanent forms.
His garden's all furious change,
budding and rot and then the coming up again;
why prefer any single part of the round?
I don't know that he'd change a word of it;
I think he could be forever pleased
to participate in motion. Something opens.
He writes it down. Heave steadies
and concentrates near the lavender. He's already there.
In Africa the wine is cheap, and it is
on St. Mark's Place too, beneath a white moon.
I'll go there tomorrow, dark bulk hooded
against what is hurled down at me in my no hat
which is weather: the tall pretty girl in the print dress
under the fur collar of her cloth coat will be standing
by the wire fence where the wild flowers grow not too tall
her eyes will be deep brown and her hair styled 1941 American
will be too; but
I'll be shattered by then
But now I'm not and can also picture white clouds
impossibly high in blue sky over small boy heartbroken
to be dressed in black knickers, black coat, white shirt,
buster-brown collar, flowing black bow-tie
her hand lightly fallen on his shoulder, faded sunlight falling
across the picture, mother & son, 33 & 7, First Communion Day, 1941--
I'll go out for a drink with one of my demons tonight
they are dry in Colorado 1980 spring snow.
on St. Mark's Place too, beneath a white moon.
I'll go there tomorrow, dark bulk hooded
against what is hurled down at me in my no hat
which is weather: the tall pretty girl in the print dress
under the fur collar of her cloth coat will be standing
by the wire fence where the wild flowers grow not too tall
her eyes will be deep brown and her hair styled 1941 American
will be too; but
I'll be shattered by then
But now I'm not and can also picture white clouds
impossibly high in blue sky over small boy heartbroken
to be dressed in black knickers, black coat, white shirt,
buster-brown collar, flowing black bow-tie
her hand lightly fallen on his shoulder, faded sunlight falling
across the picture, mother & son, 33 & 7, First Communion Day, 1941--
I'll go out for a drink with one of my demons tonight
they are dry in Colorado 1980 spring snow.
A Little Tooth
by Thomas Lux
by Thomas Lux
Your baby grows a tooth, then two,
and four, and five, then she wants some meat
directly from the bone. It's all
and four, and five, then she wants some meat
directly from the bone. It's all
over: she'll learn some words, she'll fall
in love with cretins, dolts, a sweet
talker on his way to jail. And you,
your wife, get old, flyblown, and rue
nothing. You did, you loved, your feet
are sore. It's dusk. Your daughter's tall.
Section VII from The Scarlet Ibis
by Susan Hahn
Bird
Once, I got lost,
flew over that place,
saw the tourists in their wrinkled pastels.
The memorial between the barracks B
The bronze barbed-wire figures twisted
to torment, the wedged-shaped
building, its barred entrance,
the strip of marble extending
through a hole in the roof,
the menorah resting at the top.
I felt weak
and landed on it.
No one could believe what they saw B
me resting there B
so they pretended not to see.
(pause)
I stood for much more than a moment,
watched all those bare legs
move from spot to spot,
thought how much I needed
to find a way back
to my flock.
Lady
And you expect me to believe this?
Bird
As I do you
(pause)
and do not.
Once, I got lost,
flew over that place,
saw the tourists in their wrinkled pastels.
The memorial between the barracks B
The bronze barbed-wire figures twisted
to torment, the wedged-shaped
building, its barred entrance,
the strip of marble extending
through a hole in the roof,
the menorah resting at the top.
I felt weak
and landed on it.
No one could believe what they saw B
me resting there B
so they pretended not to see.
(pause)
I stood for much more than a moment,
watched all those bare legs
move from spot to spot,
thought how much I needed
to find a way back
to my flock.
Lady
And you expect me to believe this?
Bird
As I do you
(pause)
and do not.
You know that it is there, lair
where the bear ceases
for a time even to exist.
Crawl in. You have at last killed
enough and eaten enough to be fat
enough to cease for a time to exist.
Crawl in. It takes talent to live at night, and scorning
others you had that talent, but now you sniff
the season when you must cease to exist.
Crawl in. Whatever for good or ill
grows within you needs
you for a time to cease to exist.
It is not raining inside
tonight. You know that it is there. Crawl in.
where the bear ceases
for a time even to exist.
Crawl in. You have at last killed
enough and eaten enough to be fat
enough to cease for a time to exist.
Crawl in. It takes talent to live at night, and scorning
others you had that talent, but now you sniff
the season when you must cease to exist.
Crawl in. Whatever for good or ill
grows within you needs
you for a time to cease to exist.
It is not raining inside
tonight. You know that it is there. Crawl in.
