picking up all the toys
Oh as usual all I can see is time & death
Everything is already lost
& not coming back
LITTLE OLD LADIES
We know we’re supposed to shut up now & tremble off
into the wilderness of a golf course on the edge of a retirement community
& fall down crying in a sand trap
moaning about the sadistic hurricane of time
that’s flattened our downtown & ruined our hayfields and barns
We’re supposed to stand out in the rain-starved pasture like cows about to get tipped
& no good for milking
Some kids are vaping in their truck at the edge of the field, getting up their courage
Those pink clouds have moved off to the east & night is wrapping the world
in a crappy torn sweater
The pharma companies are drawing near, promising many indelicate side effects
in a soothing voiceover
Young professionals lining us up on city view balconies to be shoved off
Internet scammers lasering targets on our foreheads
Light flashes in our eyes
the vitreous gel detaching from the retina
our skin loosening & separating from our weak little bones
It’s just like a fairy tale, we’re turning into birds—ortolans
about to be dined on in dark institutions
Soon we’ll be pissing vodka in our bedpans
pulling the fire alarm, wandering out into traffic
No one will know about our epic journeys down the hall
sailing to the dining room & back
or the monsters we had to bitch slap to come this far & survive
So we’re telling you now in our little old voices
while we wait to be scraped away
like worn paint, while you turn from us to the window & open the plastic curtains
not wanting to breathe us in
DEATH & MEMORY
Some people are remembered for being beheaded . . .
& some for autoerotic asphyxiation . . .
Some people open the cage door & step in with the tiger
deliberately or accidentally . . .
Either may boost their book sales briefly . . . which is seldom the reason . . .
It’s more like a pleasant but unintended outcome . . . that they can’t enjoy . . .
Occasionally people are remembered for being lethally injected . . . but more often
pets are kept in mind . . . their ashes in a box labeled with a photograph . . .
Photographs are useful for remembering the dead . . . but not that useful . . .
Dreams of the dead are better because you don’t know you’re dreaming . . .
But when you wake up you know . . .
& waking life is full of death every minute . . .
Some people are remembered with exhausting biographies
& maybe a quasi-historical mini-series . . . featuring people with better teeth
& many plot-serving inaccuracies . . .
Others just fall into tiny crevasses & disappear
like a river of termites . . .
It’s hard to keep thinking of the dead . . . when they never call or text . . .
like people you used to be in love with . . . who said they couldn’t live without you . . .
Patron saints are dead people . . . & some people talk to them . . .
but saints are strangers . . . who lived a long time ago, in itchy clothes . . .
& religion is a waste of time . . . when you could be drinking . . .
Some people talk to their ancestors & say they talk back . . .
but my ancestors just lie there . . . like badly stored cigars . . .
Not even my parents will speak to me . . .
They just linger underground
in a smaller & smaller font . . .
No one knows what happens when you die . . .
except for the gases & putrefaction . . .
Death is a story with a terrible beginning . . . & dead people
are passive characters . . .
Maybe it’s better to forget them . . . so they don’t trouble you . . .
like trauma . . . or commercial jingles . . .
so you can continue . . . living . . .
STAY
So your device has a low battery & seems to drain faster each day.
Maybe you should double your medication.
You might feel queasy, but also as if the spatula flattening you to the fry pan
has lifted a little.
So your breath comes out scorched, so what.
Inside, trust me on this,
there’s a ribbon of beach by a lake,
in the sand, fragments of a fossilized creature resembling a tulip.
Back in the Paleozoic, online wasn’t invented yet
so everyone had to wander alone & miserable through the volcanic wastes
or just glue themselves to a rock hoping someone would pass by.
Now you can sob to an image of your friend a continent away
& be consoled.
Please wait for the transmissions, however faint.
Listen: when a stranger steps into the elevator with a bouquet of white roses not meant for you,
they’re meant for you.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Gratitude to the editors of the following journals for previous publication of these poems:
Adroit Journal (www.theadroitjournal.org): “Ghosted”
American Journal of Poetry: “Babies at Paradise Pond”
American Poetry Review: “Animals,” “Archive of Recent Uncomfortable Emotions”
Five Points: “Art of Poetry,” “Ex”
James Dickey Review: “August,” “Comfort of the Resurrection”
Literary Matters (www.literarymatters.org): “High Desert, New Mexico”
Los Angeles Review of Books: “AlienMatch.com” (as “aliens.com”),“Wolf Song”
The New Yorker: “Ways of Being Lonely”
Plume Poetry 8: “Song for Sad Girls”
Plume Poetry 9: “Small Talk”
Plume (www.plumepoetry.com): “Résumé”
Shrew: “I Can’t Stop Loving You John Keats”
Southword (Ireland): “Black Hour Blues,” “Happiness Report,” “The Miraculous,” “Still Time”
Washington Square Review: “Stay,” “The Truth”
Women’s Review of Books: “All Hallows,” “Little Old Ladies,” “Telepathy”
“Babies at Paradise Pond” also appeared in The Ekphrastic Writer, edited by Janée J. Baugher.
“Black Hour Blues” was awarded Third Prize in the Gregory O’Donoghue Poetry Competition (Ireland), 2017.
“Grace,” “To the Woman Crying Uncontrollably in the Next Stall,” and “Winter Solstice” appeared in The Night Could Go in Either Direction, a collaborative chapbook with Brittany Perham, from Slapering Hol Press in 2016. “To The Woman Crying Uncontrollably in the Next Stall” also appeared in the anthologies Nasty Women Poets, edited by Grace Bauer and Julie Kane, and Women of Resistance: Poems for a New Feminism, edited by Danielle Barnhart and Iris Mahan; and online at Diode and the Paris Review blog, Poetry RX.
“Guitar” previously appeared in Across the Waves: Contemporary Poetry from Ireland and the United States, edited by Gerry LaFemina.
“High Desert, New Mexico” was also featured on BBC Radio 4’s “The Lightning Field,” September 8, 2018.
“People You Don’t Know” received First Prize in the 2018 Mick Imlah Poetry Prize competition and appeared in the Times Literary Supplement (UK).
“The Earth Is About Used Up” takes its title from a line by Paul Guest.
Thanks to the Civitella Ranieri Foundation, the Camargo Foundation, and La Romita School of Art, where some of these poems were conceived. Thanks to Susan Browne, Sara Jane Hall, Emily Lindner, Donna Masini,
Brittany Perham, and Elizabeth Sanderson, inspirations all.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kim Addonizio is the author of several previous poetry collections including Tell Me, a finalist for the National Book Award. Her other books include a memoir, Bukowski in a Sundress: Confessions from a Writing Life, two novels, two story collections, and two books on writing poetry: The Poet’s Companion: A Guide to the Pleasures of Writing Poetry (with Dorianne Laux) and Ordinary Genius: A Guide for the Poet Within. She has received numerous honors for her work, including two NEA Fellowships, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and Pushcart Prizes in both poetry and the essay. Her poetry has been translated into several languages including Arabic, Chinese, Spanish, and Italian. She is an occasional presenter for BBC Radio and teaches privately in Oakland, California, and online. www.kimaddonizio.com.
BOOKS BY KIM ADDONIZIO
POETRY
My Black Angel: Blues Poems and Portraits (with Charles D. Jones)
Mortal Trash
Lucifer at the Starlite
What Is This Thing Called Love
Tell Me
Jimmy & Rita
The Philosopher’s Club
FICTION
The Palace of Illusions (stories)
My Dreams Out in the Street
Little Beauties
In the Box Called Pleasure (stories)
NONFICTION
Bukowski in a Sundress: Confessions from a Writing Life
Ordinary Genius: A Guide for the Poet Within
The Poet’s Companion: A Guide to the Pleasures of Writing Poetry (with Dorianne Laux)
Copyright © 2021 by Kim Addonizio
All rights reserved
First Edition
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Jacket photograph: © Can Stock Photo Inc. / savateev
Production manager: Beth Steidle
The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows:
Names: Addonizio, Kim, date– author.
Title: Now we’re getting somewhere : poems / Kim Addonizio.
Other titles: Now we are getting somewhere
Description: First Edition. | New York, NY : W. W. Norton & Company, [2021]
Identifiers: LCCN 2020051547 | ISBN 9780393540895 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780393540901 (epub)
Subjects: LCGFT: Poetry.
Classification: LCC PS3551.D3997 N69 2021 | DDC 811/.54—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020051547
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