Words I Couldn't Stop E-Book

Joyce Shintani

• Herausgeber: Books on Demand
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Serie: Joyce Shintani. Poetry
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 13

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

The collection "Words I Couldn't Stop" is the first of two collections of Joyce Shintani's poetry. It contains her early and middle poems: lyrical, pastoral, sensorial; reflections on otherness, religion, love and nature. Partly autobiographical, the poems are characterized by delicacy and vulnerability but can also deliver a punch. Formally, they range from short haiku-like verses to longer poems; rhythms vary from strict meter to free verse. The poems hold a tense balance between structural lightness and tough messages.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

1

Innocence

2

Flush of Life

3

Eruption

4

Fire Heart’s Stones to Stars

5

Urgency Is Authority

6

Final Closure

1 Innocence

Attending

Shadow thing lurks inside

robbing breath and time;

makes spring thrush envied sister,

whispers stabs at night.

What hard thing beneath the breast?

cramping, sparking mine!

Tight crumpled knot—

whole galaxy—

waits to feel

unfurled.

Childhood

Lacerated innocence

black-boxed in pain

desperation insensate—

numbness the only surcease

from metal-toothed horror.

2 Flush of Life

Fifth Month in Germany

Skirt: crisp cotton

desert-hot air

and asphalt

Santana on open face

open belief, I can do it;

possibility—a probability.

Shiny auto new

clean and hot

glinting expectations.

Steel, concrete, hope—

all of a package.

Face to sun

bright smile unafraid—

unaware:

emptiness behind openness.

Cloud gray day

Regenschnee

lead-air pressure

Hölderlin-heavy immobility

stasis—

fixed on

vorbei.

Oh, California

Oh, young half-woman…

Birthday

I view the hurdles I must take

to pass from girl to wife,

yet cling to toys and high-pitched voice,

elude responsibility.

But a humming tone reminds me:

I’m bound to stretch

if I’ll catch

my thirty-second year.

Homage to Barbara

Small compact form

white satin skin

boar bristle hair.

Softness, comfort, balsam.

Prickly warrior for truth!

Beside you

I marvel

at your pillowy grace

and want to leash you in.

You bark then a word

—independent flight!

The ouch:

hugging tight

let go.

That Fellow

That fellow

who makes

the popping noise

with his mouth

as he passes—

it seems he’s just

nothing—

better—

to do

or pop