[New-Poetry] Finalists for the Lenore Marshall Prize

[Anny Ballardini]

DUST

Someone spoke to me last night,
told me the truth. Just a few words,
but I recognized it.
I knew I should make myself get up,
write it down, but it was late,
and I was exhausted from working
all day in the garden, moving rocks.
Now, I remember only the flavor--
not like food, sweet or sharp.
More like a fine powder, like dust.
And I wasn't elated or frightened,
but simply rapt, aware.
That's how it is sometimes--
God comes to your window,
all bright light and black wings,
and you're just too tired to open it.
-from What We Carry 
Dorianne Laux

NEVER AGAIN THE SAME

Speaking of sunsets,
last night's was shocking.
I mean, sunsets aren't supposed to frighten you, are they?
Well, this one was terrifying.
Sure, it was beautiful, but far too beautiful. 
It wasn't natural.
One climax followed another and then another
until your knees went weak 
and you couldn't breathe.
The colors were definitely not of this world,
peaches dripping opium,
pandemonium of tangerines,
inferno of irises,
Plutonian emeralds,
all swirling and churning, swabbing, 
like it was playing with us,
like we were nothing,
as if our whole lives were a preparation for this, 
this for which nothing could have prepared us 
and for which we could not have been less prepared.
The mockery of it all stung us bitterly.
And when it was finally over
we whimpered and cried and howled.
And then the streetlights came on as always 
and we looked into one another's eyes--
ancient caves with still pools
and those little transparent fish
who have never seen even one ray of light.
And the calm that returned to us
was not even our own.

Dorianne Laux, from the net.

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: TheOldMole 
  To: NewPo 
  Sent: Tuesday, August 29, 2006 5:23 PM
  Subject: [New-Poetry] Finalists for the Lenore Marshall Prize


  Christian Barter, The Singers I Prefer (CavanKerry Press)
  Jack Gilbert, Refusing Heaven (Knopf)
  Dorianne Laux, Facts About the Moon (W.W. Norton)
  Eleanor Lerman, Our Post Soviet History Unfolds (Sarabande Press)
  Ron Slate, The Incentive of the Maggot (Mariner Books)


  Gilbert looks like the favorite.


  Tad Richards
  www.opus40.org
  http://opusforty.blogspot.com/
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