February 2022
Bio Note: I am a hot sauce aficionado and a lover of ampersands. My first book of poems, Shiva’s Drum, was selected for the National Poetry Series. Bone Music was selected for the Louise Bogan Award. I teach writing and literature at the University of Vermont and live with my lovely wife and uber-creative daughter in Burlington.
Whole
The wind through this tree
proves that music
can be made from being split
in two then split again.
So today I’m trying
to memorize the 10,000
songs of wind through leaves,
trying to let those airy
riffs become my musculature,
calibrate my breath.
Impossible pastime,
but anyway I raise a toast
to the wind, & to all
the miniature obstacles
& mazes we living creatures
make for it: bark & leaves
right down to cicada & flea,
aphid & the noble earth
worm. The wind, divided
& redivided exponentially
by reeds, never stops
trying to bring balance,
rushing into low pressure.
Gale, zephyr, squall, gust:
my fingers & legs split
them all, as daily
we ourselves are split,
as daily we break & break
because it’s the only way
to make of ourselves
music, the only way
to stay whole.
©2022 Stephen Cramer
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