Year 2014

* bee-ntanglement with ross gay

José Angel Araguz Leave a comment

I like reading a poem and finding myself admiring how tangled it is in its words. When done well, it changes Robert Frost’s adage No tears for the poet, no tears for the reader for me into No entanglement for the poet, none for the reader.

The poem below, Ode to the Beekeeper by Ross Gay from his collection Bringing the Shovel Down, is a good example of what I mean. With the subject declared in the title, it’s fun to watch what kind of bee-related words are drawn in (note the tension of the second use of “chamber” towards the end, the tension with “heart” in the same line).

Another thing I noted in rereading was the structure. The poem consists of one really long sentence followed by two short ones. The effect is similar to the staggered flight of a bee as much as the subject’s fascination with them.

* comb a little closer *

* comb a little closer *

Ode to the Beekeeper – Ross Gay
for Stephanie Smith

who has taken off her veil
and gloves and whispers to the bees
in their own language, inspecting the comb-thick
frames, blowing just so when one or the other alights
on her, if she doesn’t study it first — the veins
feeding the wings, the deep ochre
shimmy, the singing — just like in the dreams
that brought her here in the first place: dream
of the queen, dream of the brood chamber,
dream of the dessicated world and sifting
with her hands the ash and her hands
ashen when she awoke, dream of honey
in her child’s wound, dream of bees
hived in the heart and each wet chamber
gone gold. Which is why, first,
she put on the veil. And which is why,
too, she took it off.

***

Happy veiling!

Jose

* new poem up at Luna Luna

José Angel Araguz 4 Comments

Happy to announce that my poem “Quinceañera” has just been published online by Luna Luna as part of their 3o Latin@ Poets/30 Days project.

This poem is a special one for me. I was allowed to go into what the poem means to me in a Q & A accompanying the poem. Here’s what I said regarding the poem:

What inspired to you write about a quinceañera?

 

The poem had its kernel in memory, which for me is at turns messy and marvelous. My mother gave birth to me when she was fourteen. She left my father a year later. In so many ways, my mother and I grew up alongside one another, surviving. Like most who grow up without, we didn’t know what we didn’t have until much later. One day while explaining about quinceañeras, someone asked if my mother had had one. I realized I had never had that thought, and that, after having me so young as well as leaving a relationship so young, I’m sure she never had the chance to consider it. I felt both startled and guilty as I realized that the struggle begun with my birth continued to that very day when I didn’t have an answer to such a simple question. This is where memory is messy. I found myself writing roughly around this feeling of being startled, of not knowing, until I pushed and saw what I did know. This is where memory is marvelous. I found myself celebrating my mother in the way given me, creating line by line a space where I was able to give something back to her. The line about the “son” dreaming startled me anew when I wrote it because of the permission it granted. It is a memory I wish I had.

***

Check out the poem and the rest of the Q & A here.

See you Friday!

Jose