Poem-A-Day: Evening Primrose by Amy Greacen

Evening Primrose by Amy Greacen Oenothera biennis Early adopter, familiar of vespertine temporal specialists, itinerants: who said your life would be easy? Chance encounters, chancy neighborhoods, the lean ground nothing cultivated will possess. But you, night-bloomer, all strings of dubious exes, loose ends, unabashedly seedy--you need no excuse. This is simply what you do.  Daze them with perfume, bombshell;  daylight's gaudy attractants are nothing to you.  Instead, take moonlight to the next level; take the dunes, parking strips, waste ground that, for the right body--well,  presents the perfect opportunity. Herb of the X chromosome: you know stigma. You don't care.  Wherever the ground's disturbed, you're there, brash, sticky with longing, a complex quadruply branching ripple-effect array of balanced-lethal genes and a flair for risk. You know why you are here, let no one say  otherwise, heterotic odalisque; X marks the spot, and hot things happen next; slippery, brimming inner places; oils surefire for increasing suppleness and desire  and damn the consequences, baby;  they're on your turf now.        Copyright © 2013 by Amy Greacen. Used with permission of the author.     About This Poem "The collection from which this poem is excerpted is a riff on ancient botanical and pharmacological volumes (Theophrastus, Pliny, Galen, etc). I've always been fascinated by the echoes between the properties of herbs and trees and flowers and various human drives and patterns and experiences. Evening primrose is a weed with some unique reproductive tactics, which I found interesting because it has a long and well-vetted reputation for improving female fertility. Its unusually-shaped stigma even looks like a big X, as if the plant is advertising its usefulness for female (x-chromosome) complaints. Coincidence? Paracelsus would probably have said there's no such thing."    --Amy Greacen June 20, 2013 Amy Greacen's collection A Modern Herbal is forthcoming from Measure Press in January 2014. Her poems have appeared in The Best American Poetry series in 2010 and 2012. In fall 2012, she was writer-in-residence at the James Merrill House in Stonington, Connecticut.     Related Poems Epitaph X by Thomas Heise Botanica by Eve Alexandra Queen-Anne's-Lace by William Carlos Williams Poem-A-Day Launched during National Poetry Month in 2006, Poem-A-Day features new and previously unpublished poems by contemporary poets on weekdays and classic poems on weekends. Browse the  Poem-A-Day Archive.     Thanks for being a part of the Academy of American Poets community. To learn about other programs, including National Poetry Month, Poem in Your Pocket Day, the annual Poets Forum, and more, visit Poets.org.

Forward this email This email was sent to prentice654.allsms@blogger.com by poetnews@poets.org |   Update Profile/Email Address | Instant removal with SafeUnsubscribe™ | Privacy Policy. Academy of American Poets | 75 Maiden Lane | Suite 901 | New York | NY | 10038