Poem-A-Day April 20: The plum you’re going to eat next summer

Hello Friends,
Poet Gayle Brandeis shared today’s poem at an open mic in 2024 and it quickly found its way to Instagram. The way Gayle Brandeis feels about plums in this piece reminds me of how I feel about poems.
Enjoy.
— Ællen

The plum you’re going to eat next summer

The plum you’re going to eat next summer
doesn’t exist yet; its potential
lives inside a tree you’ll never see
in an orchard you’ll never see, will be touched
by a certain number of water droplets
before it reaches you, by certain angles
of light, by a finite amount of bugs
and dust motes and hands
you’ll never know. The plum you are
going to eat next summer will gather
sugar, gather mass, will harden
at its center so it can soften toward
your mouth. The plum
you’re going to eat next
summer doesn’t know
you exist. The plum you are
going to east next summer
is growing just for you.

■

Poem-A-Day April 19: Zebra Question

Zebra Question

I asked the zebra
Are you black with white stripes?
Or white with black stripes?
And the zebra asked me,
Are you good with bad habits?
Or are you bad with good habits?
Are you noisy with quiet times?
Or are you quiet with noisy times?
Are you happy with some sad days?
Or are you sad with some happy days?
Are you neat with some sloppy ways?
Or are you sloppy with some neat ways?
And on and on and on and on
And on and on he went.
I’ll never ask a zebra
About stripes
Again.

■
Today’s poem by Shel Silverstein comes from A Light in the Attic (1981). Shel Silverstein was also previously featured for Poem-a-Day April 26, 2014 (“The Little Boy and the Old Man”), Poem-A-Day April 18, 2011 (“Peanut-Butter Sandwich”), Poem-A-Day April 30, 2009 (“Where the Sidewalk Ends”), and Poem-A-Day April 21, 2007 (“Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout”).

Poem-A-Day April 18: Papi, Papá

Papi, Papá

I catch my head again.
I expect to see my father
entering a room. I catch
my head starting to turn

and I’m on the disappearing end
of an island, thinking of
the girl from El Salvador
whose sentences

are polite in a recording
from migrant detention.

They identify countries
of origin, not names. A crying
boy from Guatemala

says Papi, Papi, Papá. Dad, Daddy,
Father, I miss you. Please walk

through the door again.
Please inhabit your body.

Does he construct
a memory or a daydream

where his father, wearing the last
outfit he was seen in, enters
from the other side of a cage?

When I try to rebuild my father
it’s his hair first, his shoulders, scenarios
of posture. I couldn’t look at

the last thing he wore. I had
the chance I could not do it.

A child doesn’t understand
separation. Absence is

transformed into a game: disappearance,
reappearance, a face
behind hands. I was there

the morning my father
crossed an undeniable border
and a boy is at the border now.

He catches his head
turning, looking

to the door and back, Papi,
Papá and the country beyond

the facility is desert and
wire and everything, everything

in this wide, cold
place is a pale-yellow polo,
tucked in at the waist.
A shirt his father wore.

■
Hello Friends,

In today’s poem, poet Sara Daniele Rivera recalls her own grief at losing her father while listening to audio recordings of migrant children held in detention at the US-Mexican border. Rivera is a Cuban/Peruvian artist, writer, translator, and educator from Albuquerque, New Mexico. “Papi, Papá” can be found in her collection The Blue Mimes, which won the Academy of American Poets First Book Award.

One way you can support migrant children is by donating to Legal Services for Children, an organization led by Cathy Sakimura that helps secure a path to lawful immigration status for undocumented minors, assists with DACA applications, and supports minors who are in, or have recently been released from, immigration detention. The federal government recently terminated funding for legal representation for unaccompanied children and youth who are here without their parents, cruelly leaving these children to represent themselves in court. Legal Services for Children is currently fighting this termination.

Thank you for celebrating poetry month with me.

— Ællen

Poem-A-Day April 17: joy or kindness or ketchup

Hello Friends,

Yesterday’s poem was about an argument with another person. In today’s poem, Chen Chen argues with the universe.

One of the best things about April is the number of events held in honor of National Poetry Month. If you enjoy today’s poem, you may wish to check out a livestream poetry reading tonight featuring Chen Chen & Brenda Hillman, hosted by the Poetry Society of America. Some other exciting upcoming events include Latino Poetry – Places We Call Home on April 22 if you’re in DC, and the Academy of American Poets’ annual Poetry & the Creative Mind on April 24 via livestream.

Thank you for celebrating poetry month with me!

— Ællen

God, Gods, Powers, Lord, Universe—

If you cannot, at the moment, give me much joy,
I get it. I have asked
& received many a great joy
already. Just give me, if you can spare it,
a small joy, say, the size
of a ketchup packet. If that’s too much
to ask for, then how about a small
kindness, a tiny kindness, the size of a kiss
from a dust mote? No?
Okay. Would it be possible for you to take
away some things, then? For instance,
the soreness on the right side of my neck?
If you could remove maybe half
a pinch of that soreness, I would leap up
as though it were a great joy. I mean,
it would absolutely be a great, great joy,
thank you in advance. O
highest O mightiest O most.
Still no? Well. What about this
sense that everything is slipping
right out of my fingers & faster
every day? I’m not asking you to cure
my fear. Nor unslipify
my fingers. Only, if you could,
if you have a quarter of a split
nanosecond, it would be
greatly appreciated, see, I don’t
need joy or kindness
or ketchup, I
beg you, if you are
a being, a higher, some
Mysteries that can listen, can
mercy, I just need to lose
a little
less quickly.

■
Chen Chen was also previously featured for Poem-A-Day April 18, 2023 and Poem-A-Day April 24, 2020.

Poem-A-Day April 16: prove him wrong

He Tells Her
(for Ruth B.)

He tells her that the Earth is flat —
He knows the facts, and that is that.
In altercations fierce and long
She tries her best to prove him wrong.
But he has learned to argue well.
He calls her arguments unsound
And often asks her not to yell.
She cannot win. He stands his ground.

The planet goes on being round.

■
Hello Friends,

Do you have an argument you lost that’s stuck with you? Do you believe “she cannot win” is a permanent state, or does the last line indicate it might just be temporary?

It was hard to pick just one poem to send you from the delightful 2023 collection The Orange and Other Poems by Wendy Cope. The title poem from that collection, “The Orange,” was previously featured for poem-a-day here.

— Ællen

Poem-A-Day April 15: wet figs glistening

Gathering

     —for Sugar

Through tall grass, heavy
from rain, my aunt and I wade
into cool fruit trees.

Near us, dragonflies
light on the clothesline, each touch
rippling to the next.

Green-black beetles swarm
the fruit, wings droning motion,
wet figs glistening.

We sigh, click our tongues,
our fingers reaching in, then
plucking what is left.

Under-ripe figs, green,
hard as jewels—these we save,
hold in deep white bowls.

She puts them to light
on the windowsill, tells me
to wait, learn patience.

I touch them each day,
watch them turn gold, grow sweet,
and give sweetness back.

I begin to see
our lives are like this—we take
what we need of light.

We glisten, preserve
handpicked days in memory,
our minds’ dark pantry.

■
Hello Friends,

What is glistening in your mind’s dark pantry? Today’s poem comes from the 2000 collection Domestic Work by the former poet laureate of the United States Natasha Trethewey. Trethewey has also been featured for several previous poem-a-days, which you can revisit here.

— Ællen

Poem-A-Day April 14: Necessary Conditions

Today’s poem by Justice Ameer (xe/xyr) has a form that is hard to preserve on mobile phones, so I have included an image of the poem as well as the text below. Ameer writes about this poem, “Expanding on the work of [Karl] Marx, W. E. B. Du Bois recognized the enslaved Black worker as ‘the founding stone’ of American capitalism, and thus, the system of chattel slavery was a necessary condition for the industrial development of white Western colonial powers and the global market they dominate today. True racial justice requires a complete return and redistribution of the wealth generated by exploited African labor—back to Black, Indigenous, and colonized peoples. Reparations will be achieved, whether it is offered or it must be taken.” This poem was originally published as part of the Academy of American Poets Poem-a-Day series on July 24, 2024.

Necessary Conditions by Justice Ameer

Necessary Conditions

               I WANT THE COTTON BACK
               I WANT THE FIELDS IT GREW FROM
               I WANT THE FOOD IT BOUGHT
               I WANT THE CLOTHES IT WEAVED

I WANT THE BLOOD IT SUMMONED
          THE SUN IT DEMANDED
          THE SCARS IT PAID

               I WANT THE COTTON BACK
               I WANT ITS LEAVES
                         ITS STEMS
                    ITS THORNS
                         ITS ROOTS
               I WANT EVERYTHING
                         BUT ITS WHITE
I WANT THE COTTON BACK.
     WE’LL TAKE THE COTTON BACK.
          WE’LL TAKE BACK EVERYTHING IT TOOK OF US.

■

Poem-A-Day April 13: Even more so

Even more so
because of being alone
the moon is a friend.

■
Hello Friends,

The moon is still pretty full, so we’re featuring one more moon poem by the great haiku master Yosa Buson (1716 – 1784). In the original Japanese, this haiku follows the format you are probably familiar with: 5 syllables, 7 syllables, 5 syllables. This English translation comes from Haiku Master Buson: Translations from the Writings of Yosa Buson – Poet and Artist – With Related Materials by Yuki Sawa & Edith Marcombe Shiffert.

You can view even more haiku previously featured for poem-a-day here.

Thank you for celebrating poetry month with me!

— Ællen

Poem-A-Day April 12: The Moon Is on Wellbutrin

Hello Friends,

Yesterday’s poem finished with a scattering of pill bottles, and today we’re going to read one more medication-induced poem. Today’s selection by poet Diannely Antigua can be found in the December 2024 issue of Poetry Magazine. The epigraph “After Joshua Jennifer Espinoza” may be a reference to inspiration from that poet’s poem “The Moon is Trans.”

Thank you again for celebrating poetry month with me!

— Ællen

The Moon Is on Wellbutrin

     After Joshua Jennifer Espinoza

Why else would she lift her shirt every night
to show the world her one milky
breast? My sister says Wellbutrin
sparked her slut era. I say, I don’t need
Wellbutrin for that. The moon used to be on
Zoloft, before trying Prozac, before adding
Klonopin to her lunar chemistry. The moon is on
Propranolol. She’s an anxious bitch,
left to borrow light from the brightest
orb around. What she wouldn’t do
to be the sun, allowed to come
out during the day when the humans are awake
and buying things, and she—just a sliver
of existence, the distance of thirty Earths
away from touch. Who could be this cruel
to leave her wanting? The father was
probably an asshole, the mother some
aloof star. She’s been used by too many
singers, painters, and scientists, too
many witches and hipsters who absorb
her essence from bowls of water
left outside overnight. I’ve used the moon
in this poem, metaphor, hunk of rock.
I’m sorry little moon, my moonly
moon. You know, the moon can be
both super and blue. Tonight, let’s take
our moon-shaped pills together. Let me
carry the weight of you.

■

Poem-A-Day April 11: SICK4SICK

Hello Friends,

The final image of today’s poem sticks with me for days every time I read it — we’ll see if it sticks with you, too. torrin a. greathouse (she/they) is an award-winning transgender cripple-punk poet and essayist. Today’s poem comes from her 2024 collection DEED.

Thank you for celebrating poetry month with me!

— Ællen

SICK4SICK

I think my lover’s cane is sexy. The way they walk
like a rainstorm stumbles slow across the landscape.
How, with fingers laced together, our boots & canes
click in time—unsteady rhythm of a metronome’s limp
wrist. All sway & swish, first person I ever saw walk with
a lisp. Call this our love language of unspoken:
We share so many symptoms, the first time we thought
to hyphenate our names was, playfully, to christen
ourselves a new disorder. We traded tips on medication,
on how to weather what prescriptions make you sick
to [maybe] make you well. We make toasts with
acetaminophen bought in bulk. Kiss in the airport
terminal through surgical masks. Rub the knots from
each others’ backs. We dangle FALL RISK bracelets
from our walls & call it decoration. We visit another
ER & call it a date. When we are sick, again, for months
—with a common illness that will not leave—it is not
the doctors who care for us. We make do ourselves.
At night, long after the sky has darkened-in—something
like a three-day-bruise, littered with satellites I keep
mistaking for stars—our bodies are fever-sweat stitched.
A chimera. Shadow-puppet of our lust. Bones bowed into
a new beast [with two backs, six legs of metal & flesh &
carbon fiber]. Beside my love, I find I can’t remember
any prayers so I whisper the names of our medications
like the names of saints. Orange bottles scattered around
the mattress like unlit candles in the dark.

■