Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Girl In Chair by Mary Biddinger

 
My newest poet-crush is Mary Biddinger.  I say this often, but it's always a great day when you discover an amazing new poet.  Support poets!  Buy Poetry! 
 
Also, check out her blog: Wordcage.
 
This is one of my favorite poems from this book.  I had a really hard time choosing just one poem to post because they're all superb.  This is my favorite because I love the imagery:
 
Girl In Chair
By Mary Biddinger
 
The streets sew themselves
a beaded mat you can buy
every night.  Catfish in bed
with the rushes.  Everything
sleeping deep together.
 
Needlepoint is half blood
most of the time.  You miss
once, twice, by the window.
How else to stitch flowers,
or the red mailbox waiting
for a postman’s blue vest.
 
All a game of in and out.
Blood waiting to dump
its oxygen, the mosquito
and waxwing, storm fronts
quaking above as moths.
 
A seam-ripper hacks
the work in seconds, string
cut to a quarter.  Your love
is the one sunk, midnight
in the Monongahela.  How
did you not wake when
the river broke like a pane?
 
A page slits your fingertip
but you keep turning.  Now
the cicadas start their fall
from tree to lawn.  Cherry
blossoms ride the gutters.
Lightning on the air, men
chasing their hats home.
From:  “Prairie Fever” by Mary Biddinger, pages 53, 54
 
(The Monongahela is a river on the Allegheny Plateau in north-central West Virginia and southwestern Pennsylvania.)
 
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"Saint Monica" by Mary Biddinger
 
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and her newest book, coming soon:  "O, Holy Insurgency"
 
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"Poetry is life distilled." ~Gwendolyn Brooks
 
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Happy Thanksgiving!
 
For each new morning with its light,
For rest and shelter of the night,
For health and food, for love and friends,
For everything Thy goodness sends.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson
 
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3 comments:

Phoenix said...

I'm alllll about being a poetry slut - having a crush on as many poets as possible at once :)

Last year it was Bukowski and ee cummings that I was obsessed with... this year I think Emily Dickinson and Buddy Wakefield are winning.

Poetry was meant to be loved enthusiastically :)

marybid said...

Thank you! Sending cheer from Akron.

Jonas said...

I do so love your tastes in poetry.