"It's Not Easy Being Green" by Debra Kang Dean

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend October 29, 2018   It's Not Easy Being Green   Debra Kang Dean

Whatever her story is, today and every day that I'm here, she's here in her long, quilted green coat, her companion—a beagle?— nose to the ground, its tail a shimmy. Unlidded to lidded trash can they go, and all along the fence lining the stream, looking, I think, for whatever salvageable cast-offs can be found. By all appearances, she doesn't need to, but who knows, maybe she does. The day after the first snow, she'd stopped, asked, What's that you're doing? and, to my answer, Yes, she'd said, of course, taiji. Today, as I turned southwest into Fair Lady Works the Shuttles, in it lost, there they were, close by, again, her companion sniffing along the fence at court's edge, and she, standing by. I want to believe by now that she and I have gone beyond just being fair-weather friends as, moving on without pause, we simply smile, nod, say, Hello. Or don't.                Copyright © 2018 Debra Dean Kang. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   "When I wrote 'It's Not Easy Being Green,' I had been thinking a lot about seeing and being seen, about presence and invisibility, and practicing taiji three- to five-times a week on a basketball court at a small park in my neighborhood. I would afterward walk around the park, looking around before heading home, and, having long focused on craft, I wanted to practice seeing better. So, some days I took a picture on the walk, and some days I wrote short poems when I got home, aiming for karumi, Bashō's late aesthetic of lightness and transparency of language. The woman at the park and I saw each other regularly through the changing seasons and, as I look at this poem again, it seems possible that beyond the one practicing taiji or Kermit the Frog, I could be the woman in her green coat or even her dog moving along the fence. This poem is for Kathleen Driskell, whom I've known since 2003." —Debra Kang Dean   Debra Kang Dean's most recent book is Totem: America (Tiger Bark Press, 2018). She is on the poetry faculty of Spalding University's low-residency MFA in writing program and lives in Bloomington, Indiana. Poetry by Dean   Totem: America (Tiger Bark Press, 2018) "The Horses Run Back to Their Stalls" by Linda Gregerson "Economics at Gemco" by John Olivares Espinoza "Prayer on Aladdin's Lamp" by Marcus Wicker October Guest Editor: Ross Gay   Thanks to Ross Gay, author of Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2015), who curated Poem-a-Day this month. Read more about Gay and our guest editors for the year. 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