An Un-Encouraging Icon
My baby was not born
while I was at war
or when I returned.
There's love. I learned
the women use one
fewer consonants than the men
do. There's also lover.
There's not much I can say
about this layer
cake of knowing.
I'm eighty. I'm eighty,
and I was a roller skater.
Sugar. I still have
all my teeth.
The Hope That Life Would Return
The possibilities of every life
Build a culture of life
A culture that values every life
No human life should be started
Assassins took the life
In the hope of an easier life
For each life saved
The loss of innocent life
The matchless value of every life
The dignity of every life
The richness of life
Succeed in life
The path ahead should lead to a better life
We will improve our quality of life
We are grateful for the good life
A life of personal responsibility is a life of fulfillment
Our job is to make life better
Schools can teach this fact of life
Children succeed in life
Get involved in the life of a child
Taking on gang life
The knowledge and character they need in life
Change a life forever
The rest of your lifetime
Extend life for many years
People receiving life-saving drugs
Life-extending drugs
Eventually come back to life
Self-appointed rulers control every aspect of every life
The United States is a partner for a better life
Life since 9/11 has never been the same
A special place in our country's life
The shadows of American life
Human life is never bought
Human life is a gift from our creator
The loving god behind all of life.
Text from State of the Union addresses, 2001 – 2007
Jenna Cardinale is the author of Journals, a chapbook from Whole Coconut. Her poems have appeared in number small-press journals, including 6x6, Court Green, and Foursquare. Big Game Books has just published a "tinyside" of her poem, "Four Hands." She lives in New York.
Sunday, December 23, 2007
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Danica Colic
Backwards
Brick to dust, ore again
to its hollow veins,
glass to sand The trees
again, and the birds
backwards to roost
The thrilled grasshoppers
in pelts of grass
Here are the rivers
thrashing with fish, floodwater
brimming, oh mineral, oh
disease
Buffalo and weather
Thickening weather, the ocean
thick as oil The sun
cutting, beckoning
come to me
The earth
calling to itself, all
the stars calling
to each other, again
again Everything
unbuckles: water, grain
virus
Oh my heart,
all the made
is unmade
and gallops to the center—
the only
place left; every other place
is erasure, every other place
is particle—
which is home
Isn’t this sex Isn’t this
the final Glory Was I ever
a name
After
Will there be a memory
of structure
of tree apart or
one foot in front of
the other
a flock of birds
dividing a bird
then a bird’s eye
watching another a feather
the
rolled stem of a feather
and the fan of threads along it each a
different length
each an each how we will miss
the separate branches and the voices
among the branches calling return
return what
will we be when
there is no we only
the singular element
what
will It be without longing
without the arched feathers
of the throat which seeks
another
Danica Colic teaches at Hunter College, where she also received her MFA degree. Her poems have recently appeared in Terrain.org, and are forthcoming in Arts & Letters and Pebble Lake Review.
Brick to dust, ore again
to its hollow veins,
glass to sand The trees
again, and the birds
backwards to roost
The thrilled grasshoppers
in pelts of grass
Here are the rivers
thrashing with fish, floodwater
brimming, oh mineral, oh
disease
Buffalo and weather
Thickening weather, the ocean
thick as oil The sun
cutting, beckoning
come to me
The earth
calling to itself, all
the stars calling
to each other, again
again Everything
unbuckles: water, grain
virus
Oh my heart,
all the made
is unmade
and gallops to the center—
the only
place left; every other place
is erasure, every other place
is particle—
which is home
Isn’t this sex Isn’t this
the final Glory Was I ever
a name
After
Will there be a memory
of structure
of tree apart or
one foot in front of
the other
a flock of birds
dividing a bird
then a bird’s eye
watching another a feather
the
rolled stem of a feather
and the fan of threads along it each a
different length
each an each how we will miss
the separate branches and the voices
among the branches calling return
return what
will we be when
there is no we only
the singular element
what
will It be without longing
without the arched feathers
of the throat which seeks
another
Danica Colic teaches at Hunter College, where she also received her MFA degree. Her poems have recently appeared in Terrain.org, and are forthcoming in Arts & Letters and Pebble Lake Review.
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