[New-Poetry] Jason Shinder, 52, Poet and Founder of Arts Program

[Anny Ballardini]

from The New Yorker: http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/poetry/2007/10/01/071001po_poem_shinder
Living
by Jason Shinder October 1, 2007 


Just when it seemed my mother couldn't bear



one more needle, one more insane orange pill,

my sister, in silence, stood at the end



of the bed and slowly rubbed her feet,



which were scratchy with hard, yellow skin,

and dirt cramped beneath the broken nails,



which changed nothing in time except



the way my mother was lost in it for a while

as if with a kind of relief that doesn't relieve.



And then, with her eyes closed, my mother said



the one or two words the living have for gratefulness,

which is a kind of forgetting, with a sense



of what it means to be alive long enough



to love someone. Thank you, she said. As for me,

I didn't care how her voice suddenly seemed low



and kind, or what failures and triumphs



of the body and spirit brought her to that point-

just that it sounded like hope, stupid hope. 





  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: amy king 
  To: NewPoetry: Contemporary Poetry News &Views 
  Sent: Monday, May 05, 2008 3:46 AM
  Subject: Re: [New-Poetry] Jason Shinder, 52, Poet and Founder of Arts Program


  Whoa.  I had no idea he was sick.  I met him many years ago at -- believe it or not -- a party in George Plimpton's famous upper-East side apartment in Manhattan, and he was always friendly and inviting wherever I saw him after.  So young!

  Amy


  _______


  http://www.amyking.org 



  ----- Original Message ----
  From: "jforjames at aol.com" <jforjames at aol.com>
  To: new-poetry at wiz.cath.vt.edu
  Sent: Sunday, May 4, 2008 7:58:48 PM
  Subject: [New-Poetry] Jason Shinder, 52, Poet and Founder of Arts Program


  http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/03/arts/03shinder.html?ref=arts
  By MARGALIT FOX
  Published: May 3, 2008

  Jason Shinder, a poet, anthologist and teacher who founded the Y.M.C.A. National Writer’s Voice program, one of the country’s largest networks of literary-arts centers, died on April 25 at his home in Manhattan. He was 52 and also lived in Provincetown, Mass.

  His death was announced by the Academy of American Poets, which said that Mr. Shinder had been ill with lymphoma and leukemia for several years.


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