All That Is Limitless by Hannah Gamble

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend November 7, 2014   All That Is Limitless   Hannah Gamble

I usually wake up with acquisition in mind.   I make myself the tallest pine; I have more birds on me than anybody!   The sun hits my head first—it’s cooled a bit by the time it gets to your head.   I thought I’d get the most   if all the good saw me first and affably went there.   It was sound, my lightening rod approach.   One oversight was that when the bad was coming it also saw me first,   and would match its force to my height in a way that, I’m sure, if I had a stutter or a limp would be lessened.   In any case, it’s time to get lowly.   Put on a formless gown and call it a shroud for your vanity, a gold braid o’re your forehead   or a word you have to explain to everyone at the table.   Even if it wasn’t vanity, but hunger. Even if it was mostly enthusiasm and affectionate regard. An invitation to join (less like “participate” and more like “become an actual part of,” cutting a part off so it fits more snugly with the other part.)   Now you have a bed. Now you have a table.   If the wood is still living we’ll make not furniture but a living structure: We can do what we call grafting. This too requires a bit of cutting.   A dormant bud can be cut and grafted, as can a young shoot, but in all cases the point of vascular connection can end up weak due to the varying strengths of the two formerly distinct tissues.   Once I blew my nose in a cafe despite the number of approximate men in beautiful sweaters and I knew I’d become another thing.   Now when a block is sawed up it is made into implements.   The finest sculptor carves the least. In this way, the block rests within all that is limitless.            Copyright © 2014 by Hannah Gamble. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   “The original title of this poem was ‘For Anthony Madrid, Lover of the Tao.’ Anthony is a poet with me here in Chicago, and a dear advisor and guardian. I changed the title eventually because I didn’t want the reader to attribute any of the speaker’s strangeness (basically mine) to him.” —Hannah Gamble   Hannah Gamble is the author of Your Invitation to a Modest Breakfast (Fence Books, 2012). She lives in Chicago, where she is the current Artist in Residence at the Museum of Science and Industry. Most Recent Book by Gamble   Your Invitation to a Modest Breakfast (Fence Books, 2012) "My Pentagon" by Heather Christle "the earth is a living thing" by Lucille Clifton "Meaningful Love" by John Ashbery 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