This poem by friend Susan Rich is stunning, even more so than the gorgeous reading by Nic Sebastian
Category Archives: this & that
Poetry: “Power Outage Elegy” by Nathan McClain
My daughter can’t understand
why, when I press the button,
the parking garage door doesn’t budge.
The car stuck. The park too far
for her small legs to walk. These things
happen, I say. It’s no one’s fault.
In the apartment courtyard, the tenants are gathered —
one complains he’s missing the Laker game,
one can’t charge her cell phone,
another’s laptop is dead.
The power,
of course, isn’t the problem — we’re each unprepared
for such sudden loss,
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Poetry: I Loved You From Another Star by Rosebud Ben-Oni
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I Loved You from Another Star
He’s always coming back, our neighbor, never quite here.
His wife, who teaches English, will never leave Seoul,
so he’s present part-year
past-participle— a joke he tells without a face.
We watch
his cat Monkra who looks exactly like our cat, who also wakes him
before sunrise, whining for food. Call him Momo for short,
and we do, no questions. He deals in import-export,
never carries a briefcase, only a pamphlet
of English grammar his wife authored.
He says she doesn’t understand
what I do for a living,
that poetry is for children and nine-tailed foxes
favored in Korean dramas that he and I discuss in secret,
away from our disapproving spouses.
Rosebud Ben-Oni
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New Poems Published in “Melusine”!
Very excited and honored this morning to say that I have two poems included in the winter issue of Melusine, a journal for women in the 21st century (but not just for women, and not just including women). Huge respect and thanks to editor Janelle Elyse Kihlstrom, and I’m especially pleased because I love the work of two other poets in this issue – Mary Cresswell and Simon Perchik (I’ll link Mary’s poem below along with mine).
Dear Peter
I came home tired from China.
You were a sudden warmth on a violet doorstep –
Present and tender, with a smudge of laughter.
Closer than calluses, you sway me and
I fall.
Check out Mary’s “Spy Story” poem here.
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R. City – Make Up (Lyric Video) ft. Chloe Angelides
Dance, baby. Dance.
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Poem: Figure and Ground
I try to understand the small outside I let in that year:
artichoke, orchid, what was beautifully composed. I admired
every sentence he spoke and the valleys of grape
Lauren Camp, Heron Tree
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Wiz Khalifa Puts His Own Spin on Adele’s “Hello”
Pure, raw talent
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Poem: ‘Father’ by Jessica Piazza
Befall
A door is alarming, left open. A leaving;
belief that the exited party will memorize
reasons to find you again. And then. When
it happens, what Saturdays. What planned
activities. What woman that rends your
days. What ways you insist that your hair
can be combed and your failings cannot
be recorded.
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Tumbledown Trailer feat. Jason Sudeikis and Rebecca Hall
I love everything about this.
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The Truths Only Starlings Will Speak
Wings rutting through dust like glittering,
hardened sky, I’m fool enough to believe
this bird’s dying, not sunning—body unfurling
like a gasoline stain, acrid iridescence rushing
asphalt that could fry an egg to savory silk.
I drop to my knees as he arches and lashes,
scapulars open as mantle feathers curl and lilt.
He’s a Japanese fan, throat tucked flush, tail
an untamed fractal spent as the heat striating
him.
Sara Henning, Thrush
Coffee and Irony 