Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Getting Personal

Eleanorboardman.jpg

This blog is read by more people than I keep track of, and linked to the school where I study (who, by the way, have yet to feature my writing here).  Those are two good reasons who I shouldn't post my own poetry.  But this one is called "Copenhagen," and was written here, so that excuses it.  Also, everything in this journal is written by me, and this is no exception.

Copenhagen


Describe a lake as seen by a young man who has just committed murder. Do not mention the murder. 

-From “The Art of Fiction” by John Gardner (1983)


Two white curtains in a rented room

sit heavy on their dusty sill.  Her body already aches

for this place, braces for the separation.  The visa in her coat

is counting days.


At the window, she thinks of

two men who never saw this city, and tries to measure

how long she will watch the cars, smell the smoke, 

rinse reminders off her palm.


America is only a place

where great aunts sewed dresses and great Depressions

hung fathers.  She threw that story away

and came to the old world to breathe its harbor air.


Describe a city as seen

by a young woman who has lost.

Do not mention the loss.

1 comment:

  1. I like this a lot. I think a lot of us feel that way, that need to find a separate space from our American pasts.

    ReplyDelete