01 Mar The Yearning To Hold a Living Thing Too Close by Luke Daly
Sparrow is the shape of my palate—
I put her in my mouth. I form my lips
into a holy-oak bivouac, field observatory
for the bird to flee the Ford’s wheel well
over clam pink glaze of sunken twilight snow
and the tungsten teeth of my redwing boots;
her pulse on the flat of my tongue may rise
like dampened tympani up neural filigree,
up blood map and plumage of the aspen
tips and aspen limbs ringing the silver lake,
up the milk-skin of my eye scanning stars freshly,
up and out the phloem sluice and xylem thrush
the open breath ringing the forest’s hidden cello
of April, when I ever want to be the other thing.
I put her in my mouth. I form my lips
into a holy-oak bivouac, field observatory
for the bird to flee the Ford’s wheel well
over clam pink glaze of sunken twilight snow
and the tungsten teeth of my redwing boots;
her pulse on the flat of my tongue may rise
like dampened tympani up neural filigree,
up blood map and plumage of the aspen
tips and aspen limbs ringing the silver lake,
up the milk-skin of my eye scanning stars freshly,
up and out the phloem sluice and xylem thrush
the open breath ringing the forest’s hidden cello
of April, when I ever want to be the other thing.
About the Poet
Luke Daly writes and lives in Buffalo, NY, where Lake Erie ends and the Niagara River begins. His work can be found in Subtropics, Basalt, Poetry City USA, and Ghost City Review. He teaches full time as a senior lecturer in Rochester Institute of Technology’s University Writing Program and is a teaching artist for Just Buffalo Literary Center. This poem originally appeared in Poetry City, Volume 8, in 2018.
Related Event
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- Luke Daly will lead a reading and book discussion of Ross Gay’s National Book Critics Circle Award-winning collection Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude as part of Just Buffalo Literary Center’s city-wide In Gratitude project from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. on Monday, March 2nd, at Just Buffalo Literary Center, 468 Washington Street, 2nd Floor, in Buffalo, NY. The first five people to register at justbuffalo.org will receive a free copy of Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude. The event is free and open to the public. The reading and discussion event with Just Buffalo teaching artist Luke Daly will be repeated from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, March 11th at the same location.
The Poem of the Week feature is curated by literary legacy awardee R.D. Pohl.