Thursday, January 31, 2013

new from above/ground press: Other Brief Discourses, by Abby Paige



Other Brief Discourses
Abby Paige
$4

I. Embarking

Should my point of departure be the dust
to which I will return? Or the water of which
I am composed? Or

I’m told the poet asked, are birds free
from the chains of the skyway?
So I depart from air.

One accustomed to the sea takes not long
to trust air’s buoyancy.
So let breath be

the place we start from. Let the sun
rise in our wake and our ship shudder
as we descend through cloud.

The river below, a forked black tongue
darting through the snow, I named
for the patron of cooks, put to death on a grill.

The maps I drew four centuries ago
I compare with land from the vantage of birds
and am not dissatisfied.
published in Ottawa by above/ground press
February 2013
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy


Abby Paige is a poet, performer, and freelance writer whose work has appeared in the United States and Canada, most recently in ottawater #9. Her solo show, Piecework: When We Were French, has toured in New England and Quebec. She received her MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars and is a former Fulbright scholar.



To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; outside Canada, add $2) to: rob mclennan, 402 McLeod St #3, Ottawa ON K2P 1A6 or paypal at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com

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