Speculations About "I" (audio only)
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Recorded at the Chancellors Reading, Poets Forum 2015. NYU Skirball Center. New York City.
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I went down to
mingle my breath
with the breath
of the cherry blossoms.
There were photographers:
Mothers arranging their
children against
gnarled old trees;
a couple, hugging,
asks a passerby
to snap them
like that,
so that their love
will always be caught
between two friendships:
ours & the friendship
of the cherry trees.
Oh Cherry,
why can’t my poems
be as beautiful?
A young woman in a fur-trimmed
coat sets a card table
with linens, candles,
2011
We like the houses here.
We circle the lake turning
into dark cleavages, dense-packed gleamings.
We could live here, we say.
We’re smiling, but thinking
of the houses at the last resort:
The real estate agent looked surprised
when she saw Bruce’s face; then flipped
2017
Bruce Derricotte, June 22, 1928–June 21, 2011
What was there is no longer there: Not the blood running its wires of flame through the whole length Not the memories, the texts written in the language of the flat hills No, not the memories, the porch swing and the father crying The genteel and elegant aunt bleeding out on the highway (Too black for the white ambulance to pick up) Who had sent back lacquered plates from China Who had given away her best ivory c
2012