Find and share the perfect poems.
She remains important: think of Leni
Riefenstahl; Helena, Montana; Mount
St. Helens, with all its residue. Think
of Ellen Glasgow; Eleni (marvelous non-
fiction by Nicholas Gage). Think of all
those Arthurian Elaines, easy to mix up.
What about Lainie Kazan—she’s a Helen too.
Was this the face that launched a thousand
ships? Yes, all of them bearing her name.
From Hear Trains by Caroline Knox. Copyright © 2019 by Caroline Knox. Used by permission of Wave Books.
Their sound is gone out, belts out a choir
visible and audible here in the transept
North East West South: acronym, N E W S
gone out andante into all lands
turf and twig. (An OED or google game
[tran—across; septum—enclosure],
as this item: “The pediment of the southern
transept [of Kiddington] is pinnacled,
not inelegantly, with a flourished cross.”)
and their words I keep reminding myself
unto the ends of the world swept
So sault means “jump,” as in
sauter in France, but not
in New France! In Old France
the l dropped out. In New,
they kept it: Sault Ste. Marie,
the leap, the rapids. But
in a linguistic roux, Sault
became Soo, reduced. Very
practical, actually, like
semaphores or an aquifer.
on the campus of the University
of California at San Diego
among endearing neighbors:
Geisel Library, named for Dr.
Seuss, and cheek by jowl
with John Muir College,
named for the
pioneer naturalist and
ur-ecologist. Niki de
Saint Phalle fecit
1983. Curiously,
Sun God manages
to look both matte
and shiny at the
same time. It is a toy.
A man. A bird.
A woman, a bat.
It evokes Calder in its
“plain speaking.” It
evokes poster paint.
Made of fiberglass,
its innards