Downstairs in Dreams by Chase Twichell

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend February 10, 2016   Downstairs in Dreams   Chase Twichell

Trying to fall asleep, I count down stone steps into the dark, and there they are: Centaurs, half in and half out of the woods, hindquarters still trees. Downstairs in dreams I look directly into their man-eyes, which are opaque, absorbent. They don’t speak. I don’t speak of the long yellow teeth tearing off the little dress—just for a glimpse, no harm done. No hands, no harm. Their hindquarters still trees. No words to explain or contain it. You can’t translate something that was never in a language in the first place.            Copyright © 2016 Chase Twichell. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   “My father was a Latin teacher, so at bedtime we got the classic myths and stories from The Odyssey, including a variety of creatures half-human, half-animal. Centaurs in particular fascinated me because they were both horses (longed for) and mature male sexual beings (feared). The poem cages childhood trauma in myth and dream, which acknowledges and preserves the fact of it but keeps it safely remote and unreal.” —Chase Twichell   Chase Twichell is the author of Horses Where the Answers Should Have Been: New & Selected Poems (Copper Canyon Press, 2010). She splits her time between the Adirondacks of northern New York and Miami Beach.   Photo credit: Margaret Miller Poetry by Twichell   Horses Where the Answers Should Have Been (Copper Canyon Press, 2010) "The Hand" by Mary Ruefle "First Gestures" by Julia Spicher Kasdorf "Why Latin Should Still Be Taught in High School" by Christopher Bursk Poem-a-Day   Launched during National Poetry Month in 2006, Poem-a-Day features new and previously unpublished poems by contemporary poets on weekdays and classic poems on weekends.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