Photo by Annie Spratt via Unsplash
Another poem from my forthcoming collection a woman made entirely of air (Dancing Girl Press, 2023). This is a NaPoWriMo effort! I wrote the first draft on April 13, 2020. It was first published, along with Cargo, in Tinderbox Poetry Journal in the fall of the same year.
Forgive Me: A Cento
What moves through the human body away from our silence knows forgiveness. Miles from the limits of whatever is slow as black smoke, the sky forgives. Don't wait for anything else. We become muzzles sealed with stubborness. Eating, too, is a thing now only for others. This is the way water remains upon the sun, red with pain’s leaping ember. Anything more from you now-- rich bass notes from walnut speakers, inebriation, more ink-- measured against all the dark, is a world. I am not any closer to saying what I mean. Listen to what the water says. Let meaning burrow into molars. I am a fool. Even as the red impatiens wither and brown, forgive me. Hear the leaves? I am already memory. Sources: [Meredith Stricker, Cristopher Soto, Hieu Minh Nguyen, Denis Johnson, Tommy Archuleta, Monica Youn, Elizabeth Willis, Myriam Moscona, Leonora Speyer, Rodney Gomez, Terese Svoboda, Joshua Beckman, Jane Hirshfield (1), (2), (3), Jean Valentine, Dan Albergotti, Felicia Zamora, Allison Benis White, Sam Hamill, January Gill O'Neill, Rita Dove]
First published in Tinderbox Poetry Journal, Volume 6, Issue 5, Fall 2020
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