Settling In by Jenny Factor

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend August 11, 2014   Settling In   Jenny Factor

How I loved each bare floor, each naked wall, the shadows on newly empty halls. By day, my head humming to itself of dreams, I cleaned and scrubbed to make life new; dislodging from the corner, the old moths and cicadas pinned to the screen, the carcasses of grasshoppers dangling from beams, and each windowsill’s clutter of dried beetles and dead bees. But, through each opening, each closing door, the old life returns on six legs, or spins a musty web as it roosts over a poison pot, or descends from above to drink blood in. This is how it happens: the settling in—the press of wilderness returns to carved-out space, to skin.            Copyright © 2014 by Jenny Factor. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   “This is a poem about an effort to move on with a new life in a newly-emptied house; and ultimately, about how adhesive old patterns can be. What do I see when I look at bare walls? In the bare, freed-up space, I create a new projection of my old brokenness. The stanza I used in ‘Settling In’ looks (superficially) a bit like Elizabeth Bishop’s ‘Rooster’ stanza. I always experience this shape as a kind of architecture, a rhythmic triangle, like bricks of breath. However, Bishop (the form’s inventor) and her excellent roosters, made a ruckus in stanzas of mono-rhyme. My triangular stanzas seem to be trying hard to avoid their own rhymes—until at last, rhyme has to face itself and clips the poem shut.” —Jenny Factor   Jenny Factor is the author of Unraveling at the Name (Copper Canyon Press, 2002). She teaches at Antioch University in Los Angeles, where she also lives. Most Recent Book by Factor   Unraveling at the Name (Copper Canyon Press, 2002) "The Bedroom" by Paula Bohince "Evangelize Your Love" by Jillian Weise "The Rider" by Naomi Shihab Nye Poem-a-Day   Launched during National Poetry Month in 2006, Poem-a-Day features new and previously unpublished poems by contemporary poets on weekdays and classic poems on weekends.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