Howl
a refrigerator
makes a lot
of sound
so does a bird
people are
always talking
full of love
& pain
we started
a fund
and the dogs
are needing
some money &
I don’t know
how to do
it & I’ll
learn from
one of them
Tom’s blue
shirt & glasses
are perfect.
My teeshirt
is good
my pen
works
I breathe.
Copyright © 2020 by Eileen Myles. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on December 3, 2020, by the Academy of American Poets.
“I guess the point is that everything is animal, everything’s howling, everything’s a teacher. It was not that deep into COVID when I wrote this, and always being on the computer, zooming, looking at people listening to everything, and wanting an answer about what existence is. This poem is called ‘Howl’ cause it’s a cry for help, probably happily.”
—Eileen Myles
Eileen Myles
Dennis Cooper describes Myles as “one of the savviest and most restless intellects in contemporary literature.” Holland Cotter names Myles as “a cult figure to a generation of post-punk female writer-performers.”