Lovely as always. That moment at the operating table with the moon is so stark and sudden when sutured next to the blade of the knife. The relationship between lateness and closeness, an intimacy of things as they are only when opened to their porosity, is a kind of crip futurity I am thinking through. I had an emergency surgery in August and I lay alone in a room before the procedure staring at the window thick with wet leaves above my head, wanting to cry but asking instead "please" (to someone or something or nowhere at all), when a robin slit on the window and plucked at the glass or the rain. It was enough. I think of frailty as it pertains to living in a sick body always mediating against some type of collapse, and how often my companions in pain are just the trees out my window, the sudden bird. There is something about illness—sudden or chronic—that brings us to the scrim of this world, and "now the dark rain / looks like rain" (to pull from a Mary Szybist poem I am never not thinking of), and yet how much clearer or more themselves do things and we become when prompted to lift the curtain, take it in.
My friends must get tired of me sharing these beautiful poems that you bring to my attention. I hope they speak to them as powerfully as they speak to me. Thank you for another gorgeous poem and your brilliant reflections.
Devin, great to read you diving into Jim Moore’s wonderful book. Especially well said: “I think we live in this lateness everyday, and we can choose to be aware of it or not. Though sometimes, I think, we don’t have a choice …” Moore chooses, with such specificity and perspective, and as he writes in the beautiful poem At the Last Funeral on Earth, it’s something he “will insist on doing right up to the end.”
Lovely as always. That moment at the operating table with the moon is so stark and sudden when sutured next to the blade of the knife. The relationship between lateness and closeness, an intimacy of things as they are only when opened to their porosity, is a kind of crip futurity I am thinking through. I had an emergency surgery in August and I lay alone in a room before the procedure staring at the window thick with wet leaves above my head, wanting to cry but asking instead "please" (to someone or something or nowhere at all), when a robin slit on the window and plucked at the glass or the rain. It was enough. I think of frailty as it pertains to living in a sick body always mediating against some type of collapse, and how often my companions in pain are just the trees out my window, the sudden bird. There is something about illness—sudden or chronic—that brings us to the scrim of this world, and "now the dark rain / looks like rain" (to pull from a Mary Szybist poem I am never not thinking of), and yet how much clearer or more themselves do things and we become when prompted to lift the curtain, take it in.
Beautiful post, thank you, Devin. I'm so glad you've discovered Jim Moore, a local poet here in the Twin Cities. He is so great.
Also, that last paragraph from "I think I need ..." to "... something about the light" is, I think, a poem. It just needs line breaks!
My friends must get tired of me sharing these beautiful poems that you bring to my attention. I hope they speak to them as powerfully as they speak to me. Thank you for another gorgeous poem and your brilliant reflections.
This is a gift, thank you.
Devin, great to read you diving into Jim Moore’s wonderful book. Especially well said: “I think we live in this lateness everyday, and we can choose to be aware of it or not. Though sometimes, I think, we don’t have a choice …” Moore chooses, with such specificity and perspective, and as he writes in the beautiful poem At the Last Funeral on Earth, it’s something he “will insist on doing right up to the end.”
Devin, I love your insights and writing. Thank you. D