The Southern Review articles from January 2003

The Southern Review archives from January 2003

Poem for a Friend Who Has Lost His Sanity.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Poem for a Friend Who Has Lost His Sanity Can you read this? Can you still hold a piece of paper and let the words rinse through you? I wonder what it was like to go crazy, to roar through town on a stolen motorcycle, to...

How a Poem Can Fail (the abridged version).(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... How a Poem Can Fail (the abridged version) The poem can suffer a buoyed listing, like a waterlogged boat; poor planning, hitting an iceberg, not enough lifeboats; or tidiness, hazardous symmetry, an...

I. Poetry Addresses Her Sister, the Novel.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... I. Poetry Addresses Her Sister, the Novel We're twins, but in fact, I think my father wasn't yours-newsman, bettor, drunk. Do you recall the piano tuner, how gently he slipped the upright's lid back into its joints?...

II. The Novel Responds to Her Sister, Poetry.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... II. The Novel Responds to Her Sister, Poetry Is this it? I drop down and indent? Can you hear me? Is this thing on? It isn't as easy as you'd think to take the reader's hand, their hat, and hang it on the rack,...

Enos Mills on the Divide.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Enos Mills on the Divide The enterprise was risky from the start; but I was young, and mountains gave delight, and pride. High at the sources of the Grand, my collie, Scotch, and I, in winter's heart, had camped on...

Weavings.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Weavings Of use, or lovely--they are but material, having shape and shade and texture and extension into space, commonly rectangular, and nubby to the touch, with fringe or whip-stitch edges, or a border, dark; but...

Washing the Horses.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Washing the Horses (Havana, 1839) The nuns, if they could see me now, would shake wimpled heads in wonder at how far I've drifted from the safe, staccato clack of rosary and crucifix, the pure breath of...

The Medium of Communication.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... The Medium of Communication "Bless me! what beautiful creature is that talking to Mr. Clay?" "That is Miss Vespucci, who has just come to Washington for some purpose, I know not what." "But Clay seems to be talking to...

An Entomological Soiree.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... An Entomological Soiree If nests and emerging virgin females are scattered and difficult to locate, then males search for virgins at localities that contain resources that might attract females, including flowers and water....

Laura's Hands.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Laura's Hands (The Perkins Institution and Massachusetts Asylum for the Blind, 1839) Laura traces the loop's metallic, chill sinuosity, the stem, the swollen collar, pin, bit, and her small heartface whooshes...

The Resurrection of the Body.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... The Resurrection of the Body for Keith Carter Not quite, I think, what the pious would have prayed for, These bodies flayed and hived to such permanence-- But you should know that in Florence, down a long corridor ...

Heron.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Heron In Gray Marsh, on my way home, sunset smeared above the trees, a great blue heron stepped in shallow water, but when I appeared by needlerushes near the path, he stopped. The Choptank started boiling, white...

Natural History Exhibits.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Natural History Exhibits I. Sometimes they used the hoe, or the dull blade of a shovel, a stick of firewood, sometimes the handle of the broom. I grew up around women who would kill any snake, never mind what the...

Aftermath: an Epistle.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Aftermath: An Epistle I think by now it is time for the second cutting. I imagine the field, the one above that last old house we rented, has lain in convalescence long enough. The hawk has taken back the air above new...

Rent: an Epistle.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Rent: An Epistle There were five houses over twenty years. We lived almost a decade in one, a mild, shallow winter in another. We bartered work for rent in the last, the one that had already been let go. Privet...

The Change.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... The Change She fought the house as if to rid herself of it, spring cleaning without regard for the season. My mother could drag the awkward bed to the other side of the room and still have strength enough to force the...

If only my mother had eaten Leaves of Grass ...(Poem)
January 1, 2003... If only my mother had eaten Leaves of Grass... If only my mother had eaten Leaves of Grass when I was hunched in her womb I'd have come out of her a born American poet crying "I Sing the Body Electric" and "Out of...

Dream Street: W. Eugene Smith's Pittsburgh Photographs.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Dream Street: W. Eugene Smith's Pittsburgh Photographs They hold the shapes of our light Flashed into metal--silver halide and gelatin-- Contact like the laying on of hands Or the fossil leaf printed on the sidewalk, ...

The Great Wave at Kanagawa.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... The Great Wave at Kanagawa Above you and your flimsy fishing boat About to plummet on your bald, uncovered head the swelling heave, the sea, the tsunami You will die, you know this but it takes this wave ...

Toko's Cat.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Toko's Cat Behind the screen the brush-tip of the cat's supple tail softly flicks In one skillful stroke the iris of each jade-green eye narrows to a slit Such concentration the spider is the...

Sweetfish in a Spring Current.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Sweetfish in a Spring Current Slipping completely through No effort in the way they breast the swifts and ravels On the mountain azaleas beads of clear water In the distance, a hum of bees Affixed...

Ode to My 1977 Toyota.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Ode to My 1977 Toyota Engine like a Singer sewing machine, where have you not carried me--to dance class, grocery shopping, into the heart of darkness and back again? O the fruit you've transported-cherries, peaches,...

Ode to Hardware Stores.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Ode to Hardware Stores Where have all the hardware stores gone--dusty, 60-watt warrens with wood floors, cracked linoleum, poured concrete painted blood red? Where are Eppes, Terry Rosa, Yon's, Flint, low buildings on...

For the Fog Horn When There Is No Fog.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... For the Fog Horn When There Is No Fog Still sounding in full sun past the jetty, While low tide waves lap trinkets at your feet, And you skip across dried trident trails, Fling weeds, and do not think of worry. ...

Thistle.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Thistle They've begun to overrun the ferns, tall grass, and weedy flowers between the driveway and the woods, their prickly heads bulging with seed turning to thistledown, so I pull on the thick ...

God's Penis.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... God's Penis As usual, I had my zealous eye on Nancy Morris, the object both of my desire and my envy: Professor Schneider's pet in Seminar on Jewish Mysticism, the one he'd stop his lectures for to offer some...

Morning Cigar.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Morning Cigar For Hayden Carruth A Chateau Fuente, as it happens, Dominican filler with sun-grown Ecuadorian wrappers, almost maduro, though not quite so spicy and sweet, a rich and creamy smoke, ash a...

Blue Ridge Sketchbook.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Blue Ridge Sketchbook The instant earth turns this swath of surface away from the sun, the miles of ascending ridges that articulate distance between here and the furthest purple ridge of there where the sun has left...

Reflectors.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Reflectors Drive 1 At The Lakes, the V takes you away from the traffic, though accidents happen up this way as well, the surge upwards and decline, from cryptic entanglements of salmon gums--brief but...

The Owl of Minerva.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... The Owl of Minerva At the benefit for Georgia Public Radio, I'm miked but then have to go to the men's room, it being my custom to make several nervous visits to that facility just before I give a reading, and...

E.T.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... E.T. Most things the movie gets exactly right: middle-class, California excessive "stuff"-- electronic gadgets, cast-off toys and food; American pretty, beleaguered, divorced mothers and their fatherless,...

Stories.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Stories --September 10-14, 2001, MacDowell Artist's Colony How he was an identical twin and how at twenty-five his brother started eating more and more and getting fat so that the mirror image of himself changed...

Not Buying It.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Not Buying It I lusted after the frog book with its full-page color photographs of Amazon tree frogs and also the ordinary American toad. How could material that particular, with that range of exotic and familiar ...

In the Garden.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... In the Garden She has it all, Persephone: roots and flowers, dark and light; her mother, above ground, baking bread; Pluto, in his shadowy hall, dressed in black studded with jewels, like a rock star. In the garden:...

November.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... November Now I am pulled down into the earth, out of the fields of flowers into the raw wound that opens suddenly at my feet. I hear the long dry creak of the door that leads to death, I see the crevice ...

December.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... December I go down among the roots and shadows, corms and carapaces, the closed, secret seeds, the broken ends of the ruined year. It is dark here, and cold, and the darkness deepens; the wet walls shine black in the...

Invention of the Monsters.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Invention of the Monsters The exquisite / corpse / will drink / the new / wine... --Original example of Exquisite Corpse Game, in which players take turns adding lines to a poem without knowledge of the previous line, 1939 ...

Marie Laveau, Queen of Voodoo.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Marie Laveau, Queen of Voodoo In the St. Louis Cemetery, her tomb is easy to find: all the scratchings from bits of red brick. The one with packets of beans, roses snipped at the bud, small stacks and rolls of hoodoo...

Trout Lilies.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Trout Lilies It happened I couldn't find in all my books more than a picture and a few words concerning the trout lily, so I shut my eyes. And let the darkness come in and roll me back. The old creek ...

Catbird.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Catbird He picks his pond, and the soft thicket of his world. He bids his lady come, and she does, flirting with her tail. He begins early, and makes up his song as he goes. He does not enter a house at night, or when...

Where Does the Temple Begin, Where Does It End?(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Where Does the Temple Begin, Where Does It End? There are things you can't reach. But you can reach out to them, and all day long. The wind, the bird flying away. The idea of God. And it can keep you as busy as...

Mirror.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Mirror Ordered from Winston-Salem, hauled by train far as Lenoir, unboxed, bundled in blankets, wagoned north to Blowing Rock, jolted across Middlefork, geed and hawed uphill while hands braced it from...

The Lord's Salt.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... The Lord's Salt Rooted in a roadside ditch on St. Kitts among acacias' black thorns and leaves like skeletons of fish, a morning glory has you pull over and leap across the cut. Pale blue in the early light, ...

Sea Wrack: West Indies.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Sea Wrack: West Indies Timing my reach between waves, each one rising from Friars Bay like a parenthesis, I come up with an arm's-length of driftwood draped in kelp and step back. A fragment of planking,...

Welcome to Leapers' Hill.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Welcome to Leapers' Hill With his sugarcane machete he leveled a stand of thorns for the National Trust, readying the suicide view for High Season on Grenada. From where Caribs leapt who would not bow as prisoners...

Nabokov, Mist.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Nabokov, Mist My mind has made colossal efforts to distinguish the faintest of personal glimmers in the impersonal darkness on both sides of my life. --Vladimir Nabokov, Speak, Memory At first I thought it was an elk, only...

Luffy Beluffed Laty.(Three Improper Renaissance Songs)(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Luffy Beluffed Laty --Orlando di Lasso (1532-1594) Luffly beluffed laty, I make to you this song At night your wintow unter Like trusty friend and strong. Dong, dong, dong, deary-deary, dong-dong, along-along ...

Matona Mia Cara.(Three Improper Renaissance Songs)(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Matona Mia Cara Matona mia cara mi follere canzon Cantar sotto finestra lantze buon compagnon. Don don don, di ri di ri don don don don Ti prego m'ascoltare che mi cantar de bon. E mi ti foiler bene...

Poor Dolt, Poor Dolt.(Three Improper Renaissance Songs)(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Poor Dolt, Poor Dolt --Loyset Compete (1445-1518) Poor dolt, poor dolt, be careful what you do. If ever you should marry, you'll come to grief and rue; For if you choose a young wife, she'll never lie with you. Poor...

Lourdault, Lourdault.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Lourdault, Lourdault Lourdault, lourdault, garde que tu feras, Car sy tu te maries, tu t'en repentiras; Si tu prens jeune femme, james n'en joyras, Lourdault... Elle yura a l'eglise, le presbitre la verra; La...

The Women with the Fleas.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... The Women with the Fleas --Ludwig Senti (1486-1543) The females get flea-bitten And so they wage a war; They rant and rage and threaten That fleas shall live no more. They draw their plans for winning, To...

Die Weiber mit den Flohen.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Die Weiber mit den Flohen Die Weiber mit den Flohen, die hand ein'n steten Krieg. Sie gaben gern aus Leben, und dass man's all' erschlug', und liess' ihr kein' entrinnen: Das war' der Weiber Rach'. So hatten...

The Last Judgment in an Initial C.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... The Last Judgment in an Initial C after an illumination by Lorenzo Monaco For Caelum maybe, the gold leaf translating the light of the sky onto vellum, that luminous ground from which Christ emerges like a diver...

Desire Lines.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Desire Lines They're tearing up the street again outside my window, in what seems to be an almost monthly ritual of implanting some new piece of infrastructure in the city's aging body. First they wet the pavement...

An Orange in Redlands.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... An Orange in Redlands for Joy, Chris, and Zoe The green of its leaves like snippets children scissor from a rain tarp for a class project, the bright fruit an arrangement of rubber balls painted this precise shade...

Giordano Bruno in Flames.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Giordano Bruno in Flames (Burned at the stake, February 17, 1600) A breeze's aftermath of sizzled flesh licked the strafed cobbles of Campo di Fiori, bore on its serpent's back winding through brush the last whiff of...

Last Day with Mayflower.(Poem)
January 1, 2003... Last Day with Mayflower I. We slept on ripped quilts in the trailer's shade or on the pads in the cab between jobs. The boss called us backs--our animal use, and I was a back in the gray Navy town. We...

The Black-Shawled Widows of Castilla y Leon.(Brief Article)(Poem)
January 1, 2003... The Black-Shawled Widows of Castilla y Leon step from clamorous hives of tenement houses and walk the grafted sycamore alameda, two slow, dark seasons of belief. They've come out for the night's paseo, pulling...

Next day.(Short Story)
January 1, 2003... SOME MORNINGS, ZAY WAKES UP to the unblinking sunlight of a California morning, uncertain where she is. The bedclothes, the dust on the dresser, the nightstand with the clock radio, the lamp, the box of tissues too precisely held up for view...

Luxor.(Short Story)
January 1, 2003... A ROW OF TINY BEADS OF BLOOD had formed between Pansy's thumb and forefinger, but her mother and father were in such a hurry and there was so much that had to be done with the new Pierce-Arrow touring car simply to start it that neither stopped...

Belly talk.(Short Story)
January 1, 2003... ONE MORNING, JACKIE RODE along with his father on his collection route. The day was clear, and all along the blacktop the sun glinted off silo domes. A jet left a white trail across the blue sky. Wheat fields, golden and ripe, stretched off to...

Pain is human: Wallace Stevens at Ground Zero.
January 1, 2003... LIKE MANY PROFESSORS ON COLLEGE CAMPUSES throughout the country, I found it impossible to conduct business as usual during the first class after the events of September 11, 2001. But neither did I know exactly how to proceed. How does one speak...

Habergeons, victuals, and wizards that peep: travels with the King James Bible.
January 1, 2003... THOUGH BOTH THE GULF AND ATLANTIC COASTS are heavily developed and populated, Florida's interior, especially south of Orlando, is--to lift a familiar phrase--without form and damned near void. An atlas presents little more than the big blue...

Walking home.(Excerpt)
January 1, 2003... I WALKED DOWN THE LONG DRIVEWAY to the two-lane blacktop. When I got there, I put my small, battered suitcase down beside me on the shoulder of the road and waved to my mother standing in the doorway of the old farmhouse. Several vehicles,...

"Siblings of the genus Erroneous": new fiction in review.(Book Review)
January 1, 2003... EUDORA WELTY'S "A PIECE OF NEWS," a story originally published in these pages in 1937, seems at first glance to have an almost imbecilic premise. The dramatis personae are a dreamy, ill-educated country wife, Ruby Fisher, and her brutal,...

Bearing sorrow.
January 1, 2003... IN 1959, WHEN GREGORY ORR was twelve years old, he accidentally shot and killed his younger brother Peter. It happened while the boys were hunting with their father, an Upstate New York country doctor addicted to amphetamines and risk, a...