Jacket 35 — Early 2008 | Jacket 35 Contents page | Jacket Homepage | Search Jacket |
This piece is about 3 printed pages long. It is copyright © William Stobb and Jacket magazine 2008.
The Internet address of this page is http://jacketmagazine.com/35/stobb4p.shtml
Four poems:
In a Mountain Pasture
Some Purple
Release
In/and
In a Mountain Pasture
polluted by thinking like
the whole truth and nothing
I see slides under charged wire
one awkward calf along
river rush bound by
that fire line tied to her
mind one heifer watching anyway
standing could be thinking
like what white nothing
washes tumbledown bother a blue
ripple ridgeline off-run
calves a thousand shimmers a need
beyond knowing any
living from this stream
Some Purple
don’t forget the friend off five
weeks in silent meditation
late flowers your brother
had a birthday and you’re due notice
flies mating in our bright kitchen
homeless veterans victims and criminals
perched on a power line
one squirrel sings a mournful upward fifth
birds eat what out of ash I dumped
yesterday check the live traps–Kari
saw a mottled rat waddle teach
writers to feel see speak
muscular wing thrum a lilac
room conceals shiver blown
ear to throat emote
when relevant attend to terror
in Wisconsin loud pops are often
fire crackers evil responding
not to good seven
overweight ministers rear
up in sexual glory some purple
velvet goes celluloid in petal folds
from the sun don’t forget the sun
Release
not a phase January thinking
broke me dog next door out for a pee
someone’s little laugh
after she’s shown living things once thinking
worms in wood old words splinter
winter into spring popular piano music
and a warm front from Alberta
under the brewery towers
the formerly broken
marquis sparkles that open flame
in the industrial park so not eternal
has a name release
weird sound of the day ice dam
explodes the river into flow
In/and
The illusion of privacy in the actual text
nowhere but everywhere
in the mind a concept even
buying certain fruits as an effort to
suspend myself in/and the aqueous world.
You would think
that’s private but no
I buy the fruits in front of everyone
basket carry and card swipe
say hello yes thank you
in front of everyone
and long charts of consequence
kind of marine electronica font ripple
off my shoulder as I withdraw.
William Stobb’s Nervous Systems was selected by August Kleinzahler for the National Poetry Series (U.S.A.), and is published by Penguin Books. His poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, Colorado Review, and many other journals and zines. He hosts a monthly podcast on poetry and poetics — miPOradio’s “Hard to Say.”