January 2019
I don’t think coherently about anything until I have picked up a Lamy fountain pen and let the ink glide across an unlined page in my Rhodia notepad. My family, poetry, my long-running workshop, and my standard poodle are the passions of my life. My latest book, Gravity: New and Selected Poems is now a reality; I plan to travel with it this year, and hope to meet many V-V poets along the way.
Note: Here is my offering for January. I wrote this poem years ago after reading Alicia Suskin Ostricker’s marvelous book Stealing the Language: The Emergence of Women’s Poetry in America, and realized that I could actually use the full range of the English language in my work.
Note: Here is my offering for January. I wrote this poem years ago after reading Alicia Suskin Ostricker’s marvelous book Stealing the Language: The Emergence of Women’s Poetry in America, and realized that I could actually use the full range of the English language in my work.
The Penis
Because it slips itself
into the pink silk purse
between our thighs,
because it protrudes
into the world
assuming a place
will be ready,
the penis is accustomed
to expanding
into space.
The penis determines
how men sit:
arms extending across
the back of the couch,
legs spread in an open V.
Because of the penis, men
slip what they won’t carry
into our bags:
checkbook, wallet, keys.
We accommodate,
carry big purses
that grow heavy
with a colony of things.
But, it’s the other penis
that’s powerful.
It’s the size of an arm,
grows from the forehead,
keeps the world back,
becomes the pen,
becomes the microphone,
becomes the mouth that shouts,
“Listen up,
my ideas are seminal.”
from Traveler in Paradise: New & Selected Poems, PEARL Editions, 2004
© 2018 Donna Hilbert
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