Lithuania by Phillis Levin

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend August 20, 2014   Lithuania   Phillis Levin

in memory of Jean Blecker Levin Not a trace, those days, not a sign On a map of where you were from, That farm greener than green Rolling hills, hay high as a barn Under skies without end, joy Rolling too, the way it used to. Now that you’re gone, The name of the place reappears. * Not a map in the world Will show where you are, Now that you are long gone Under the glowing ground, Lending yourself to the grass, Joined at last by Joe, who cried, As they lowered you down, “Jenny my love, my life.” * Wherever you are, being Nowhere, show me a way To be here, you who are gone Into bottomless loam: ivy Climbing the walls of waking, The walls of sleep, show me to Two on a porch waiting To see the flesh of their flesh.            Copyright © 2014 by Phillis Levin. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   “As a child, one of the first questions I asked my paternal grandmother, Jean Blecker Levin, was ‘Where are you from?’ Her answer, ‘Lithuania,’ was my first introduction to geopolitics. Though she could describe her early memories of her family’s small farm, she could not point out her birth country on a map or globe because by then Lithuania was part of the Soviet Union. When she was three, her family immigrated to Reading, Pennsylvania (the hometown of Wallace Stevens) and began to run another small farm. There she met her husband-to-be, Joseph Levin, a Reading native. Her romance with my paternal grandfather lasted until her death.” —Phillis Levin   Phillis Levin is the author of May Day (Penguin, 2008). She teaches at Hofstra University and lives in New York City. Most Recent Book by Levin   May Day (Penguin, 2008) "A Conspiracy to Commit Larceny: A Recipe" by Jennifer Militello "They Were Not Kidding in the Fourteenth Century" by Maureen N. McLane "UTOPIA: Love as Free as a Fountain" by Joe Hall Poem-a-Day   Launched during National Poetry Month in 2006, Poem-a-Day features new and previously unpublished poems by contemporary poets on weekdays and classic poems on weekends.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