Our Never by Benjamin S. Grossberg

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend October 30, 2014   Our Never   Benjamin S. Grossberg

Is the never of childhood, deeper than the never of adolescence, which has a whining, stammering quality, which is a stamped foot followed by huffing steps, and wholly unlike the never of adulthood, has none of the bright spider cracks of reason multiplying along its roof, threading its dark dome with fine lines of light. Didn’t you think, with such a cavernous never in mind, you might have consulted me? Even a 3 AM phone call would’ve been justified. On the line in the dark, you could have shared a little childhood mythology, told me about some night when you didn’t sleep, couldn’t hear your parents, and morning seemed further away than “far away,” seemed consigned to a distinct and inimitable never.  You could’ve evoked for me the particular textures of that never, explained that you were mulling them again now, assaying them for a contemporary application. Sure, I’d have been startled. What would you expect— hearing how your childhood bed sank into a hollow in the earth, or how nighttime had, snickering, closed you in its trench coat, and how the residue of the experience, the resin it left, you were brewing into something for us. I’d have wanted to see you right away and would have been myself forced to wait till next morning. So, I, too, would’ve spent an evening in an underground hollow, or bundled up inside night’s coat, wading through one never on the off chance that I could forestall another.            Copyright © 2014 by Benjamin S. Grossberg. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   “I wrote this poem at the end of a painful relationship, a sustained experiment in withholding (on both sides). That experience saturates the poem, evident not only in its belated call for communication, but also in the manner of that call—the urgency and finality of a ‘childhood never’ versus the poem’s cool surface.” —Benjamin S. Grossberg   Benjamin S. Grossberg is the author of Space Traveler (University of Tampa Press, 2014). He teaches at the University of Hartford and lives in West Hartford, Connecticut. Most Recent Book by Grossberg   Space Traveler (University of Tampa Press, 2014) "I'm a Fool to Love You" by Cornelius Eady "Not" by Sophie Cabot Black "The World as Seen Through a Glass of Ice Water" by Dobby Gibson 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