Last night I saw the beautiful, wise, inspiring woman I have adored since I was first assigned to read How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents for a college class. I saw her once before, in the fall of 2001, where she called attention to me (to me!) at the start of her reading at Powell's. (That's a story for another blog...) It was lovely to see her again and learn a few more lessons. Her latest book (today is the official pub date), A Wedding in Haiti, is an amazing we-moir (her words), not a memoir.
Here's one of her poems...
Heroics
We keep coming to this part
of the story where we're sad:
I've broken up with my true love
man after man.
You've found It;
Once, It was god.
Once, revolution
in the third world.
Now, It's love.
You'll survive, our mothers said
when romance was once.
Now they keep tight faces
for our visits home
and tell their friends
all that education
has confused us,
all those poems.
They have, we laugh,
and buy the dreams--
Redbook, House Beautiful,
Mademoiselle & Vogue--
to read our stories in them
and send the clippings home.
Sometimes the bright chase
of ad lovers in a meadow set
sells us to belief again
in that worn plot of love. . .
Sadly, we turn the page
to right our hearts,
knowing our lives too well
No comments:
Post a Comment