The Best American Poetry 2021
Page 7
can you—his saying, there,
that’s a mystery.
And you said the word as if it were new ground to stand on,
you uttered it to stand on it—
mystery. Yes, mystery he said. Yes mystery you said
talking to it now as it
took its step out of the shadow into the clearing and there you
saw it in the so-called in-
visible. Then when the wave broke the first time on what had seemed
terra firma and you knew as he held your hand
insisting you hold your ground
that there was foreclosure,
there was oldness of a kind you couldn’t fathom, and there was the terrifying
suddenness of the
now. Your mind felt for it. It felt the reach from an elsewhere and a dip which cannot hold.
Splash went the wave.
Your feet stood fast.
Your hem was touched.
We saw you watch.
We felt your hand grip
but not to move back.
Can you find that now now, wherever you are, even a candle would be a gift I know
from there. Shhh he said so you could hear it. Pity he said
not knowing to whom.
Pity you said, laughing, pity pity, and that was the day of
your being carried out
in spite of your cold, wrapped tight, to see the evening star. And he pointed. And you
looked up. And you took a breath I hear even now as I go
out—the inhalation of dark secrecy fear distance the reach into an almost-touching
of silence, of the thing that has no neighbors and never will, in you,
the center of which is noise,
the outermost a freezing you can travel his arm to with your gaze
till it’s there. The real. A star. The earth is your
home. No matter what they tell you now and what program you input via your chip or port
or faster yet, no, no, in that now I am not there
in, to point, to take your now large hand and say
look, look through these fronds,
hold your breath,
the deer hiding from the hunter is right here in our field,
it knows we are too,
it does not fear us.
Be still. Wait. And we, we
will be left behind.
Except just now. If you still once.
That you might remember.
Now. Remember now.
from The New Yorker
RACHEL ELIZA GRIFFITHS Hunger
Weeks after her death I came to the garden window
to marvel at sudden pale feathers catching, scattering
past the rainy glass. I looked for magic everywhere.
Signs from the afterlife that I was, indeed, distinct.
Beneath the talon of a red-tailed hawk a pigeon
moved briefly until it didn’t. The hawk stripped
the common bird, piercing its thick neck. Beak probing body
until I could see the blood from where I stood inside.
This could happen, naturally enough, even in Brooklyn.
This could happen whether or not my mother was dead.
I didn’t eat for weeks because it felt wrong to want bread & milk.
The hawk’s face running red, beautiful as it plucked & picked
its silver-white prey apart. It wasn’t magic, but hungrily, I watched.
As if I didn’t know memory could devour corpses
caught alive in midair. I opened the window,
knelt on the fire escape. I was the prey
& hawk. This was finally myself swallowing
those small, common parts of me. Tearing all of that away
into strips, pulling my breast open to the bone. I saw myself
torn apart, tearing & tearing at the beautiful face,
the throat beneath my claw. My grieving face red
with being exactly what I knew myself to be.
from The Paris Review
FRANCINE J. HARRIS Sonata in F Minor, K.183: Allegro
[Domenico Scarlatti, Daria van den Bercken]
Car tires rush through and announce the rain. You can hear
the shuffling of someone street sweeping in the street.
The insistent men outside Stingray’s, the cutoff lull
of ambulance testing siren, the women. who step in the street and yell
to anyone they loved once and it sounds like prelude if
Scarlatti hadn’t moved to Madrid
would he have moved the notes diatonically as the rain falls up
a roof. ascends the scaffolding. It’s impossible to read The Street
without seeing Mrs. Hedges on mine. leaning from a window on the ground
level. of my building peering out under her red bandana considering
me as I lean my body over the railing and watch the men dressed
black and in gray I tell a man to stop peeing on my car and when
he turns around. he is not surprised. He says
he isn’t peeing, he
is counting his money.
from The New York Review of Books
TERRANCE HAYES George Floyd
You can be a bother who dyes
his hair Dennis Rodman blue
in the face of the man kneeling in blue
in the face the music of his wrist-
watch your mouth is little more
than a door being knocked
out of the ring of fire around
the afternoon came evening’s bell
of the ball and chain around the neck
of the unarmed brother ground down
to gunpowder dirt can be inhaled
like a puff the magic bullet point
of transformation both kills and fires
the life of the party like it’s 1999 bottles
of beer on the wall street people
who sleep in the streets do not sleep
without counting yourself lucky
rabbit’s foot of the mountain
lion do not sleep without
making your bed of the river
boat gambling there will be
no stormy weather on the water
bored to death any means of killing
time is on your side of the bed
of the truck transporting Emmett
till the break of day Emmett till
the river runs dry your face
the music of the spheres
Emmett till the end of time
from The New Yorker
EDWARD HIRSCH Waste Management
(Skokie, 1970)
Punch the time clock
and try to keep up
with the two collectors
who trained you
since they need to finish
the route in five hours
and get to their second jobs
on time, move steadily
behind the truck,
don’t stop to rest
in the shade
between the houses,
don’t dawdle or slip
on the gravel
in the alley, watch out
for needles
and broken glass,
it’s hot as a dustbowl
in August, but don’t wipe
the sweat from your face
with your glove
or your torn sleeve,
lift the trash cans
with your whole body,
don’t embarrass yourself
and wave to a girl
from the step
of the garbage truck
racing down Niles Center Road
on the way to the dump
at the end of the day,
don’t roll on the carpet
in rage when you get home
or slam the door to your room
and topple the trophies,
; never turn yellow-eyed
with hepatitis
and land in the hospital
just to be seen.
from Five Points
ISHION HUTCHINSON David
You marveled at the vein in the marble.
The moment’s slight pulse when you approached.
His blood murmured when you neared, so I
believed, and still do. When I returned to
it, you were gone in the other country
of my head that will never, like him, age.
Long was I able to stare at the vein.
The giant must’ve just laughed and mocked him.
Then he imagined the giant’s fall, and heard
a restless quiet as far as Sokho.
He thought of the river near the vineyard,
its broad dreaming-stone. He knew it no more.
The animals looked inconsolable.
They knew their boy was lost to become king.
I was supposed to photograph you both;
but the stone sank in me and I didn’t;
my eyes going between David’s and your eyes
as the army, scattered, pushed us apart,
the tumult blotted out what I shouted
to you, which he heard, turned, nodded gently
with a killer’s uncommon sympathy.
from The New York Review of Books
DIDI JACKSON Two Mule Deer
walked past my window
this morning—female
I think, no antlers,
as the day-moon pressed
like a faded thumbprint
into the bare back
of the Santa Cruz Mountains
and the meadow of wild rye
and wand buckwheat rocked
in the new light,
all hide and eyes and hunger
moving with caution and blaze.
Is there a coming of good?
As if their path was already decided,
I watched them step into the day,
black tail tipped and wide eared.
So much of what I want
isn’t even about me.
Yesterday, a friend said
the sight of deer means danger
is clear. No coyote
or mountain lions nearby.
Still, I remember
what it feels like
to be a sidewalk,
a girl suddenly
tamped down
at an all-night party,
fingered then dropped
by a boy who will
be dishonorably discharged
from the Army
only two years later.
You know how it feels
wanting to walk into
the rain and disappear—
While hiking,
a photographer found
two deer legs
about one hundred feet apart.
Cloven hooves and dewclaws
intact. Adapted for fleeing
predators. Left by a hunter.
We are only what we are.
Don’t pity me.
A slight steam rises
from the backs of the deer
as they move past
the black oaked edge
into the white light
lifting their eyes
to the tree line,
then to my window,
then to the sky,
hooves striking the ground
over and over
like the syllables
of a low staccato voice.
from The Kenyon Review
MAJOR JACKSON Double Major
I emerge whenever he confuses the lamp for a moon.
It is then he thinks of fine bindings in ordered athenaeums.
I own his face, but he washes and spends too little time behind his ears.
He sees me in the mirror behind thick clouds of shaving
cream then suddenly believes in ghosts.
His other selves are murals in the cave of his mind. They are speechless
yet large. They steer his wishes like summer rain and amplify
his terrors like newscasters.
What he doesn’t know: his dreams are his father’s dreams, which are his
grandfather’s dreams, and so on. They possessed a single wish.
He knocks repeatedly on the bolted door to his imagination.
Tragically, he believes he can mend his wounds with his poetry.
And thus, I am his most loyal critic. He trots me out like a police dog.
He calls our thirst for pads and pencils destiny.
Our voices come together like two wings of a butterfly.
On occasion, he closes his eyes and sees me.
I am negative space: the test to all men are created equal.
We are likely to dance at weddings against my will. He pulled out the same
moves writing this poem, a smooth shimmy and a hop.
This page is a kind of looking glass making strange whatever stone-carvings
he installed along the narrow road to his interior.
I suffer in silence wedded to his convictions. He would like to tell you
the truth about love. But we are going to bed, to bed.
from The Yale Review
AMAUD JAMAUL JOHNSON So Much for America
I was interrogated via helicopter
while taking a shortcut through
a field I was handcuffed leaving
this post office I was placed in
a lineup in the middle of the street
I dress nattily I wear sports jackets
I use rubbing alcohol to keep
my sneakers clean My sweatshirts
with the stitched block letters
from certain colleges won’t stop
complete strangers from searching
my crotch I whisper uncontrollably
I smile when nothing’s funny Gun
at my temple Shit stinging my ear
Is that a knife in your hand I thought
protocol was the scruff of your collar
On the curb On your stomach
Cheekbone on the hood The smell
of good wax I’m so aware of my
body Do you think about your body
Look at your hands Show me your
hand I’m returning to Ellison
I’m surrounded You’re surrounded
But I’m always alone
from The Southern Review
YUSEF KOMUNYAKAA Wheelchair
Weeks on my back, counting
stars not up there, cutting quick
close corners in the wheelchair
Ralph kept moving true as oil,
questions silent in my mouth
after hearing a ragged sound
rattle loose from other souls
as if within my own body,
trying not to drag my foot,
& near misses in the hallway
pumped dares through blood
as we rolled into the elevator.
I can see my great-grandma
Sarah, as wheels of her chair
furrowed those chopped rows,
feet curled under her, a rake
or a hoe held in strong hands,
weeding corn, beans, & potatoes
dug to feed her hungry family
down in the Mississippi Delta,
& today it is not hard to hear
a moan rise out of black earth
where this woman raised hot
red peppers for her turtle soup.
from The Paris Review
DANA LEVIN Immigrant Song
Bitter Mother
Blue, dead, rush of mothers,
conceal your island, little star.
Trains, hands, note on a thread,
Poland’s dish of salt.
They said, The orphanlands
of America
promise you a father—
T
he ship’s sorrows, broken daughter,
the ocean’s dark, dug out.
Silent Father
Rain, stars, sewage in the spill,
hush the river.
your black boat, broken snake,
you hid. You sailed
for the meritlands of America,
dumped your name in the black
water—
In the village they pushed the Rabbi
to the wall—someone
blessed the hunter.
Angry Daughter
One says No and the other
says nothing at all—
Chicago, I will live in your museums
where Europe is a picture on the wall.
Obedient Child
I concealed my island,
my little star.
In my black boat I hid.
I hid in pictures on the wall.
I said, I am here in America,
your hero, your confusion,
your disappointment after all.
They said,
How did you end up so bad
in a country this good and tall.
from The Nation
ADA LIMÓN The End of Poetry
Enough of osseous and chickadee and sunflower
and snowshoes, maple and seeds, samara and shoot,
enough chiaroscuro, enough of thus and prophecy
and the stoic farmer and faith and our father and tis
of thee, enough of bosom and bud, skin and god
not forgetting and star bodies and frozen birds,
enough of the will to go on and not go on or how
a certain light does a certain thing, enough
of the kneeling and the rising and the looking
inward and the looking up, enough of the gun,
the drama, and the acquaintance’s suicide, the long-lost
letter on the dresser, enough of the longing and
the ego and the obliteration of ego, enough
of the mother and the child and the father and the child
and enough of the pointing to the world, weary
and desperate, enough of the brutal and the border,
enough of can you see me, can you hear me, enough