This Moment / Right Now by Roberto Carlos Garcia

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend February 20, 2017   This Moment / Right Now   Roberto Carlos Garcia

for Monica Hand   there's a whispered prayer blowing the crumbs of a season's harvest                  off a girl's plate   & a roar breaks from her insides, the roar a lioness                  a beast that knows   & a man kneels somewhere cupping his tears                  for the loneliness he feels   though he's surrounded by the world, & a finch in a tree singing                  for a lover as the buds on its branch   pop into leaves that will flourish & welcome the green grasses,                  Right now    a boy is wondering   if people can really dodge bullets & is he one of them & somewhere nobody bothers                  to ask, they simply wait   Wind spins across the landscape they say God is twirling his fingers—   The heartbroken hook new bodies, night after night, drink after drink   & I dance—my feet mashing grapes for wine & I sing mockingly—                  what is life / what is life            Copyright © 2017 Roberto Carlos Garcia. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   "I attended the poet Monica Hand's homegoing service recently and was grateful and humbled by how fully she lived her life and her dream of becoming a poet. Every time I attend a service and say goodbye to someone, I contemplate what living a life amounts to, especially if that person departed suddenly. I'm overwhelmed by the thought of billions of people caught up in a moment, and I obsess over how many people stay caught up in life instead of truly living their dream—I question that." —Roberto Carlos Garcia   Roberto Carlos Garcia is the author of Melancolía (Červená Barva Press, 2016). He teaches at Union County College and lives in suburban New Jersey. Poetry by Garcia   Melancolía (Červená Barva Press, 2016)  "Elegy" by Rachel Eliza Griffiths "from Forgetting Willie James Jones" by David Tomas Martinez "Nohemi — a Song for Paris" by Juan Felipe Herrera Poem-a-Day   Launched during National Poetry Month in 2006, Poem-a-Day features new and previously unpublished poems by contemporary poets on weekdays and classic poems on weekends. If you enjoy Poem-a-Day, please consider making a donation to help make it possible. 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