Instructions for Stopping by Dana Levin

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend March 6, 2017   Instructions for Stopping   Dana Levin

Say Stop.   Keep your lips pressed together after you say the p:   (soon they'll try and pry   your breath out—)   ―   Whisper it three times in a row:   Stop Stop Stop   In a hospital bed                            like a curled up fish, someone's   gulping at air—   How should you apply your breath?   —   List all of the people you would like to stop.   Who offers love, who terror—   Write Stop. Put a period at the end.   Decide if it's a kiss or a bullet.            Copyright © 2017 Dana Levin. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   "'Instructions for Stopping' is part of a timely anthology coming out from Beacon Press in late 2017 titled Bullets into Bells: Poets and Citizens Respond to Gun Violence in the U.S. Each poem appears with a response by a gun violence survivor or someone involved in gun violence prevention. To write this poem, I sat in a room, saying 'stop' over and over in order to hear how it sounded, to feel how it felt in my mouth. Then I wrote it down. Then I added a period, which posed the deciding question." —Dana Levin   Dana Levin is the author of Banana Palace (Copper Canyon Press, 2016). She teaches at Maryville University and lives in St. Louis, Missouri.   Photo credit: Anne Staveley   Poetry by Levin   Banana Palace (Copper Canyon Press, 2016)  "Vespers" by Louise Glück "Dead Horse" by Thomas Lux "the bullet was a girl" by Danez Smith Poem-a-Day   Launched during National Poetry Month in 2006, Poem-a-Day features new and previously unpublished poems by contemporary poets on weekdays and classic poems on weekends.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