Dear Reader,
This week we lost one of the most accessible and transcendent voices in American poetry: Mary Oliver. As paeans rippled across the digital landscape, her best-loved lines proved as strong a tonic for entropy as ever. For this, Donna Spruijt-Metz and Daisy Bassen offer us deceptively gentle poems of remembrance. On the political front, Michel Krug writes about the Greco-Roman corridors of the capital silenced by the federal shutdown and Yvonne Daley shares sage commentary on Trump's rejection of a drone solution to border security. From our archives, a poem by Abigail Carl-Klassen is essential reading as Trump proposes temporarily extending DACA in exchange for a $5.7 billion border wall.
Yours in poetry,
Elle Aviv Newton
Editor
Yesterday Small Voices
By Donna Spruijt-Metz
whispered to me through the day
slick-nosed, nudging
demanding my elusive attention
I looked up from my
busy ephemera, startled,
as if caught in mid-slaughter
all through the night the spirits
rattled around in me, after months
of silence
now they were calling me
and how beautifully
I failed words rattling
at my window, I dithered
in sleep-muddled conversation
with myself, finally sat up
blind in the dark,
felt for paper at bedside
scribbled words, fell back
into slumber this morning,
the paper was blank
I rubbed it with pencil
like a child detective,
tried to read the indents
I couldn’t make them out
a great poet passed
over us all last night
I heard her leaving
14 Lines on Mary Oliver, Her Last January
By Daisy Bassen
You’ve been folded into the crease of the year,
That cannot be pulled straight, definition by shadow,
The rumpled linen of your sharp, sacked elbows.
All bones are funny to you, the staves of your thighs,
The wicker withies of rib, the many teeth in your mouth,
And the one that cracks the chicken’s egg, the teeth
Of sycamore roots biting lustily into earth, the teeth
Of clouds, grinding the sky to a fine blue film.
You are folded away now, like a lover’s pleated rose,
Like the pierced mussel shell that gleams, a nebula
Against the water-stained sand, a crow’s black feather
Shed, a pilgrim’s talisman. You are kept safe
Against the time of going without,
Meal set against famine.
I Know More About Drones Than Anybody
By Yvonne Daley
The neighbor kid has one and I’ve studied it.
I really have. Right from my living room window.
Up close and personal. There’s no expert like me.
I know more about drones than even the president
Who knows more about drones than anybody else.
Except me. Trust me. I went to grad school
In philosophy where I met a lot of drones.
“Having drones and various other forms of sensors,
They’re all fine, but they’re not gonna stop the problems
That this country has,” the president said. And he should know,
Being the number-one problem this country has.
I should know. There’s no one who knows what a problem
He is more than me. I’d take that drone patrolling
Hazel Street over that president any day. Trust me.
I’m an expert on this.
Have you ever looked the word drone up: hanger-on, parasite,
Leech, passenger, bottom feeder; idler, loafer, layabout, good-for-nothing,
Do-nothing; informal: lazybones, scrounger, sponger, freeloader, slacker.
Sounds right, doesn’t it? The president should know.
He’s an expert after all.
Shutdown
By Michel Krug
Shutter the Parthenon!
The Rotunda and the Colosseum,
all the Greco Roman and utilitarian
buildings. Cicero silent, the lights of comity
in government centers and departments
Turned off, the furnaces
simmering cool,
bridges degenerating,
reason on furlough.
Starve democracy!
Make the Wall of fear
So high and drill the pylons so
deep that only if you submit
will there be a moratorium
on the moratorium
on all outgoing checks and balances.
Keep paying into
the national emergency
like Washington
feared autocrats from the outset,
printing checks with
imbalances then
placing federal phones on voicemail:
the public servant serving himself.
What I Remember About DACA on the Eve of Its Repeal
By Abigail Carl-Klassen
I remember the shouts of joy when DACA was signed in 2012.
I remember being told, “It’s not perfect, but it’s the best we can do for now.”
I remember the full-page newspaper ads for immigration lawyers.
I remember the call in public radio shows, “Ask us your DACA application questions.”
I remember the USCIS flowcharts distributed to nonprofits. Please give these to your clients.
I remember the battery of prerequisites for qualification.
Did you come to the United States before your 16th birthday?
Were you under the age of 31 as of June 15th, 2012?
Have you continuously resided in the United States since June 15th, 2007?
Are you currently in school, have graduated or obtained a certificate of completion from high school or have obtained a general education development (GED) certificate?
If not, are you an honorably discharged veteran of the Coast Guard or Armed Forces of the United States?
Have you been convicted of a felony, significant misdemeanor, or three or more other misdemeanors or otherwise pose a threat to national security or public safety?
I remember all the Proof of Evidence documents required once applicants made it through the flowchart. Plus forms 1-821D, I-765, I-765SW, all applicable fees and the requirement for renewal every two years.
I remember the notices for applicants to appear for biometric services.
I remember my friends who applied still felt really nervous.
I remember trying to convince myself that we should take what we could get until we could get something better. That Deferred Action just meant a deferred Path to Citizenship. That Deferred Action was not just the scraps of a Comprehensive Immigration Reform that died in Congress.
I remember Donald Trump saying, “We love dreamers; we love everybody…the dreamers are terrific!” just three days before tweeting, “Congress, get ready to do your job-DACA!”
I remember a friend told me he wasn’t going to apply because DACA was a trap. He said, “If I sign that paper, then later, when they are trying to get rid of us, they’ll have proof I was here.”