August 2016
Laurie Byro
philbop@warwick.net
philbop@warwick.net
In 1985, while pursuing a business degree, I unhappily landed in a creative writing class and announced to the group that I thought Walt Whitman was a chain of schools throughout the United States. To my astonishment, I had found my pacing, abandoned prose, and started a poetry circle that has been meeting for 16 years. I recently published a full length book, “Luna.” through Aldrich Press and “Gertrude Stein’s Salon and Other Legends” through Blue Horse Press, thanks to Tobi and Jeff Alfier. I am the Poet in Residence at the West Milford Township Library and despite it all, love New Jersey, and have lived here almost 60 years.
Author's Note: Dick Allen's fine poem, “Two Cranes,” was in the June issue of Verse-Virtual. I had written a poem about Hart Crane’s suicide which was published in the March 2016 edition of Chronogram, a Hudson Valley Magazine. One of the reasons I like participating in this community is because poems are lonely. They need one another to rub up against from time to time. Thanks Dick Allen for your poem; I thought you, among others, would enjoy reading this. The title comes from Hart Crane’s most anthologized poem "My Grandmother’s Love Letters."
After My Grandmother’s Love Letters
Poet, what made me do it on that April morning, leaning
across the railing of the ship, surrounded by souls,
my grandmother’s love letters rising in a wisp of fog,
lanky suitors—one with a serious moustache, his eyes
absinthe green and pitying. One or more are frail,
pigeon-chested, no substance, not one capable
of taking liberties, I feel one stroke my wrist, he tries
to quiet my pulse. Poet, I should be afraid; they ask
me to leave this place, to join them. Theirs is a second
chance, a salty womb, bright trumpets and angels.
Unadorned tendrils of Sargassum become our dreams,
how freeing to rest here. If letters are souls,
we have much to answer for. Poet, make an epistle
of yourself. Be adrift in your own music.
Author's Note: Dick Allen's fine poem, “Two Cranes,” was in the June issue of Verse-Virtual. I had written a poem about Hart Crane’s suicide which was published in the March 2016 edition of Chronogram, a Hudson Valley Magazine. One of the reasons I like participating in this community is because poems are lonely. They need one another to rub up against from time to time. Thanks Dick Allen for your poem; I thought you, among others, would enjoy reading this. The title comes from Hart Crane’s most anthologized poem "My Grandmother’s Love Letters."
After My Grandmother’s Love Letters
Poet, what made me do it on that April morning, leaning
across the railing of the ship, surrounded by souls,
my grandmother’s love letters rising in a wisp of fog,
lanky suitors—one with a serious moustache, his eyes
absinthe green and pitying. One or more are frail,
pigeon-chested, no substance, not one capable
of taking liberties, I feel one stroke my wrist, he tries
to quiet my pulse. Poet, I should be afraid; they ask
me to leave this place, to join them. Theirs is a second
chance, a salty womb, bright trumpets and angels.
Unadorned tendrils of Sargassum become our dreams,
how freeing to rest here. If letters are souls,
we have much to answer for. Poet, make an epistle
of yourself. Be adrift in your own music.
©2016 Laurie Byro
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