#zyzzva

[largethingslargerthings]

Meditative Weekend of Poetry: Maggie Millner

The iceberg in the movie

splits in half, a mountain falling open,

an island losing its mind,

and though we know we’re being cursed,

something buried in us stirs to watch

one body swinging cleanly into two.

When we were young,

somebody broke our heart that way.

I don’t see a future here, somebody said.

And it burned us, being spurned like that,

imagining the blank, corrupted filmstrip in his mind,

where our own beheld a peoplescape,

a story lasting past its ending,

set against a sea.

(Adapted from “Prophylaxis”, Zzyzzva #118)

(Suggestions: Try to find a place where the is very little sound and little chance that someone will interrupt you.  Place your fingers in your ears so that all sound is blocked out.  Close your eyes.  Read the poem a loud.  When finished, hum at a very low volume until you run out of breath.)

[largethingslargerthings]

Meditative Weekend of Poetry: Sophie Klahr

The girl ambles outside the bodega

holding her sentence: a hand-painted sign -

I stole from this store - checks her reflection

in the window, runs a hand through her hair,

easy as a slow wink.  Not believing

is perhaps a so much greater power

than belief.  Simple to name this turning

as denial, but what if it is more 

simple than ever that?  Shame is an o-

pening, unbidden pining, a bright pin.

She drank the milk she stole, and slaked her thirst.

(Excerpt from “Driving Through New Mexico, Listening to the Radio” Zyzzva #118)

(Suggestions: Best done at sunrise or sunset.  Read the poem aloud while walking slowly in a field or area of considerable greenery (if you live in an urban area.  When finished with poem, lay on your back and place your hands over your eyes and say whatever you remember of the poem from memory.)

[largethingslargerthings]

Meditative Weekend of Poetry: John Sibley Williams

Bright with bluebells & grass sway.  

Spring swollen river bent, bending further away.  

Well drained of actual water, more the memory of cleaning, being cleansed.

Gray hills reach up into a gray sky.  

Right on top of each other & almost touching.  

Only what we’ll never own is really ours.  I get it.

The hurt word: unraveled, that we still are unraveling,

will survive us.

(Adapted from “Dear Mr. Caufield”, Zyzzva, #118)

(Suggestions: Mark all mentions of the natural world in this poem.  Write one aspect of your biography that relates to one of these elements on ripped section of paper.  When finished, dig a six-inch hole and place all sections in clay bowl.  Burn the sections.  When finished burning, bury burnt fragments.  Do not mark where this has been done.)