How do We Read the World? An Interview with Danusha Lameris
Plus, register for our live reading and Open-Mic with Danusha this Sunday
Join The Poetry Salon’s Writing Classes Here.
How Do We Read the World?
Danusha Lameris on Her New Book, Blade by Blade (Copper Canyon Press)
Summary
What is the purpose of your poetry? In this interview Danusha Lameris and I discuss the various reasons and metaphors we have for writing. She describes it as an adventure in consciousness. It’s like riding a horse through the woods until you turn a corner and find a clearing. In her latest book, Blade by Blade she takes us on such an adventure through grief, joy, and many observations of grass and bugs. Hear her discuss more in this, our final interview of 2024.
Register for our reading with Danusha Lameris right here, right now!
Poems
Nocturne The past is a country of darkness, its long nights and arctic sun slung low over the horizon. The young woman you were, rising early, washing up the dishes left in the sink, attending to the kettle’s high-pitched wail. You can’t go back there, even as a passenger, can’t ride the night rails to find yourself locked in that long-ago loop— the drive to the hospital and back, the child still caught mid-seizure, the doctor with the telepathic touch, leaning over him with a needle to pierce his invisible veins. Time, honeyed and slow, the nurse setting out the warm towels, the man in the next cubicle yelling “You can’t make me!” in his torn voice, his feral beard pointing north. Look at the nurse, her blue scrubs, her small pearl earrings. The doctor’s pressed shirt and placid brow. As if we’d all arrived dressed for the occasion of death. Look at my son’s black hair. See how we hover there at the edge of it, the stars barely visible through the window, small specks ticking the dark, fixed in place. Night Bird Hear me: sometimes thunder is just thunder. The dog barking is only a dog. Leaves fall from the trees because the days are getting shorter, by which I mean not the days we have left, but the actual length of time, given the tilt of earth and distance from the sun. My nephew used to see a therapist who mentioned that, at play, he sank a toy ship and tried to save the captain. Not, he said, that we want to read anything into that. Who can read the world? Its paragraphs of cloud and alphabets of dust. Just now a night bird outside my window made a single, plaintive cry that wafted up between the trees. Not, I’m sure, that it was meant for me.
References
Lucille Clifton
Jane Hirschfield
Dorianne Laux
Rilke
Emily Dickinson
Jack Gilbert, The Great Fires
Tony Hoaghland
Naomi Shihab Nye
Kim Addonizio
Michael Wiegers, editor at Copper Canyon
Nadia Colburn
Derek Walcott
Kwame Dawes
Eve, After by Danusha Lameris
Utopia by Wislawa Szymborska
Vs. with Danez Smith and Franny Choi
Adrienne Rich, Diving Into the Wreck
Pacifica University
And Join us For These Other Upcoming Workshops Below.
Paid subscribers will see the link to register at the bottom of this post.
Submitting Poetry Can be Fun!
Believe it or not, you can get work published and have fun doing it. The trick is to do it with a group of friends. Together we will offer practical and moral support, suggestions for where to submit, and tips for how to get your work out there.
Don’t just make fans, make real friends.
Learn to promote your poetry online and offline. Find your ideal readers, get reviews of your work, learn how to organize a book tour, get support from those who have been there before. Have fun doing it!
Do you have a book out but no idea how to market it?
In this event, Jeannine Hall Gailey, author at BOA, will offer insights and useful tips on how to promote your book even if you are an introvert, have no experience with marketing, or are short on time.
We will follow up with a Q&A session where Jeannine will answer individual questions, and help you discover the marketing strategies that are right for you.