Dear Michael (25) by Mark McMorris

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend June 26, 2014   Dear Michael (25)   Mark McMorris

If poetry is not bread to fortify the righteous is it because we miss in it the savor of contest the whisper of blessing over a martyr’s name the light of sacral plans to take the citadel once and for all, or give it up? On the original streets lit by the sun of nineteenth- century novels the workers are gathering to march for their dignity and bread. The planters did not die of happiness. Other exhibits show their meadows their horses and women the English sunset in lands never more than a sigh like a vowel far from home. We ask too much when of the little that we have. In good health fondly yours.              Copyright @ 2014 by Mark McMorris. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   “A letter is a dispatch from elsewhere, from hand to hand. Moving through physical space, it presumes the possibility of arrival and exchange. This possibility might be thought of as the rational motive behind the transmission of any utterance, not the least as the motive behind the sending of lyric poetry, no matter how abstruse or particularized it seems. The series of epistolary poems ‘Letters to Michael’ collects twenty-five letters to date.” —Mark McMorris   Mark McMorris is the author of Entrepôt (Coffee House Press, 2010). He teaches at Georgetown University and lives in Washington, D.C. Most Recent Book by McMorris   Entrepôt (Coffee House Press, 2010) “Consider the Hands that Write This Letter” by Aracelis Girmay “On the Persistence of the Letter as a Form” by Paul Guest “The going. The letters. The staying.” by Joshua Beckman Poem-a-Day   Launched during National Poetry Month in 2006, Poem-a-Day features new and previously unpublished poems by contemporary poets on weekdays and classic poems on weekends. 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.   You are receiving this e-mail because you elected to subscribe to our mailing list. If you would like to unsubscribe, please click here.   © Academy of American Poets 75 Maiden Lane, Suite 901, New York, NY 10038