Tag the friday influence

* holding light & dark via brad leithauser

José Angel Araguz Leave a comment

Some poems move me for their ability to hold contradiction and multitudes of possibility.

This week’s poem, “A Candle” by Brad Leithauser, does just that. The phrasing starts in debate mode (“your point of view”) but quickly rises from it into suspended thought via imagery. Through the singular rhyme scheme’s quick turns, the poem leaves the reader with the image of a candle delivered *ahem* light-ly but whose undertones are dark. The suspension of thought comes, for me, in terms of the phrase “I am thinking of” which doesn’t so much pin down a bias as much as let the “single fellow” exist between “love” and “hell.” Enjoy!

* the single fellow *

* the single fellow *

A Candle – Brad Leithauser

According to
your point of view,
it stands for love –
or hell posed starkly.
I’m thinking of
the single fellow
who hunches darkly,
as though with shame,
there at the blue-yellow
center of the flame.

(from The Mail from Anywhere)

**

Happy 2015, y’all! Here’s wishing you good words and reading in the new year!

Happy centering!

Jose

* 2014 End of Year Reading

José Angel Araguz 3 Comments

Seeing as we’ll be in 2015 by next Friday – life happens that quick! – I thought I would do something different to wrap up 2014.

Below is a short reading from my chapbook Corpus Christi Octaves done on the banks of the Ohio River earlier this week. Note the heavy fog on the river: by the end of recording, we were halfway in fog ourselves.

Special thanks to my wife, Ani, for going above and beyond the call of duty in the name of poetry by both recording this reading as well as providing the cover art for the book:

* bien hecha *

* bien hecha *

The collection deals with the passing of Dennis Flinn and Christine Maloy, poet friends from my hometown Corpus Christi, Texas. The poems read – “Sky,” “Stage,” & “Snow” – are written in an eight line form, each with its own syllabic measure.

Thank you to each and every one of you who stops by and reads this blog. My goal when I started was to have a forum in which to send a little positive poetry-centric energy out into the world. Through your readership, I feel that energy to have been returned many times over.

Enjoy the reading – awkwardness, fog, & all! Good writing and reading to you in the new year!

See you next Friday!

Happy fogging!

Jose