Hill Behind Finn’s House, Val Verde, January by Iris Cushing

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend January 27, 2016   Hill Behind Finn’s House, Val Verde, January   Iris Cushing

How to get around it isn’t clear. A thicket hedged across the road,   a high curve mass of tumbleweeds.   Wind draws their tendrils tight. How to get around them.   To the left, uphill, to the right, the place   we used to be, where tumbleweeds won’t tumble.   Earth and sky and thorny combs that card them to each other.   You’re loose from your root, hair caught in a knot at your nape.   Touch a tumbleweed, it springs back. Tossed upon its thickest wisp,   a length of sisal twine worked stiff,   a fishnet glove the air can wear.   How it blows between you.   The wind that names the tumbleweed, names its purpose,   calls it by the way it moves. I didn’t know you had a cactus   now tattooed across your back. I haven’t seen you naked in so long.            Copyright © 2016 Iris Cushing. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   “Some plants spread their seeds by attaching to passersby. For the tumbleweed, the passerby is the wind, and rather than sending seeds, the whole plant hitches a ride—and in order to do so, must die. This philosophically-rich situation was the entry point for this poem.” —Iris Cushing   Iris Cushing is the author of Wyoming (Furniture Press Books, 2014). She teaches at Queens College and lives in Queens, New York.   Photo credit: Ted Roeder Poetry by Cushing   Wyoming (Furniture Press Books, 2014) "Larrea" by Louise Mathias "Dear Lonely Animal," by Oni Buchanan "Skunk Hour" by Robert Lowell Poem-a-Day   Launched during National Poetry Month in 2006, Poem-a-Day features new and previously unpublished poems by contemporary poets on weekdays and classic poems on weekends.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