#nathan mcclain

[dk-thrive]

We're unprepared for our little disappointments. Normally I might not pay attention to sunlight pouring into the courtyard but this afternoon, I do - probably because it's already nearly gone. None of us mentions the night, but I, for one, would like to be expecting it, when it comes.

— Nathan McClain, Power Outage Elegy (via Waxingwingman.org and via Alive on All Channels)

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Henri Matisse - Interior with Dog 1934, at Baltimore Art Museum

* * * * *

We're unprepared for our little disappointments. Normally I might not pay attention to sunlight pouring into the courtyard but this afternoon, I do - probably because it's already nearly gone. None of us mentions the night, but I, for one, would like to be expecting it, when it comes.  - Nathan McClain from Power Outage Elegy

[riskywiver]

[wintryblight]

Hey! Any poems on falling deeply for someone but knowing it's not meant to last?

hi anon! here are some poems that i think suit your request. enjoy reading!

Jan Heller Levi, “Waiting for This Story to End Before I Begin Another” | All my stories are about being left, / all yours about leaving.

Audre Lorde, “Movement Song” | we were always saying goodbye / in the blood in the bone over coffee

Jennifer Grotz, “Staring into the Sun” | Only then did we know. How it felt / to have loved to the end, and then past the very end.

Nathan McClain, “Love Elegy in the Chinese Garden, with Koi” | Because who hasn’t done that— / loved so intently even after everything / has gone?

Elizabeth Bishop, “One Art” | Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture / I love) I shan’t have lied. It’s evident / the art of losing’s not too hard to master

Louise Glück, “A Myth of Devotion” | When Hades decided he loved this girl / he built for her a duplicate of earth

[sashayed]

Houdini

Who would’ve known you’d grow so afraid of stillness, enclosed spaces, that you’d no longer remember a time you weren’t subtracting seconds from your life, as if each breath were held? If you had the strength to pluck your lucky quarter from behind your wife’s ear, would you have? Would she still laugh? A teakettle boils on the stove, its steam enough to unlock your lungs. Your wife reads from Robinson Crusoe, whom you cannot help but dream of, enveloped by endless miles of ocean. Outside, paper skeletons are strung up on every house in your neighborhood. You hear a boy skipping up and down the block, begging his mother, for Halloween, Mom, can I please be a ghost, please?

Nathan McClain (b. 1979) Scale, 2017

[bibliomancyoracle]

Nothing original here. Nothing new. Marble, quartz—the old

*

from “Boy Pulling a Thorn from His Foot” by Nathan McClain

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

[Tim Ingersoll]

* * * *

We're unprepared for our little disappointments. Normally I might not pay attention to sunlight pouring into the courtyard but this afternoon, I do - probably because it's already nearly gone. None of us mentions the night, but I, for one, would like to be expecting it, when it comes.  - Nathan McClain from Power Outage Elegy

[Thanks to Whiskey River]

[dk-thrive]

We’re unprepared for our little disappointments.

We’re unprepared for our little disappointments. Normally I might not pay attention to sunlight pouring into the courtyard but this afternoon, I do — probably because it’s already nearly gone. None of us mentions the night, but I, for one, would like to be expecting it, when it comes.

— Nathan McClain, from “Power Outage Elegy,” Waxwing (Issue VIII, 2016) (via The Vale of Soul-Making)

[wintryblight]

Poems about friendships that ended up falling apart? Or like still Loving past friends even though they're no longer in your life?

hi anon. i must admit this is a blindspot for me. i hardly know any poem about friendship, which is a shame. i tried my best to adhere to your prompt and ended up with poems about disintegrating relationships and lingering love in general. i’m sorry they aren’t exactly what you asked for, but i love all these poems and i hope you enjoy reading them too.

Meghan O'Rourke, “Poem of Regret for an Old Friend” | A dream is the only way to breathe. / But you must / find a more useful way to live.

Elizabeth Bishop, “One Art” | Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture / I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident / the art of losing's not too hard to master

Richard Siken, “Litany in Which Certain Things Are Crossed Out” | Here is the part where everyone was happy all the time and we were all / forgiven, / even though we didn’t deserve it.

Nathan McClain, “Love Elegy in the Chinese Garden, with Koi” | Because who hasn’t done that— / loved so intently even after everything / has gone?

Audre Lorde, “Movement Song” | we were always saying goodbye / in the blood in the bone over coffee