Poetry Thursday: A Reading

Last night, all of us--Lou, my mother, and me--sprawled in the middle room of our house (oversized chair, a virtual skyline of books and magazines--what normal folks might choose to use as a "dining" area), searching for a poem for me to share on Poetry Thursday.

We read the poetry out loud, and for about an hour, time was measured in rhyme and pentameter. Tick tock seconds rivaled syllables. Oh, he said. Yes, she sighed. How about this one, we each suggested, our voices our elbows, edging one another out of the way. Comma, explanation point, run on/drag on sentences. The dogs were the critics, the roar of the central air was the applause, and the scent of M&M brownies swirled among us like cigarette smoke and cheap aftershave, as intoxicating as a sniff of Wild Turkey; I've been drunk on those fumes. Words were intoxicating, too, more so, in fact. We tried to top each other--a lyrical shout off, and the middle room changed outfits again--smooth, jazzy club ensemble to tattered street scene from West Side Story.

Here's what I finally decided to share, though it was not the People's Choice: Page 22/ oh lucky me by Frances Chung. What a find I consider this poem to be.

Frances Chung's work, to me, is simply worded yet bursting with heavy emotion: the weight of being pre-judged, the weight of being stereotyped, the weight of representing a country or a culture, the weight of being seen yet ultimately dismissed as invisible. I will be buying this woman's book.

For more Poetry, click here to visit the Poetry Thursday website.