“Chatty, pop-cultural, comic, incisive — Denise Duhamel’s poems have
their own unique stamp, but she’s the poetic granddaughter of Frank O’Hara.”
—Ed Ochester
Healing Pies
After my parents’ accident, the pies kept coming: chicken
pot pies (sized for one person), blueberry pies, ice cream pies, peach
cobblers, lemon meringues, pecan pies, pies that were still warm in their tins,
apple pies, another chicken pot pie (a big square one), pies with chocolate
pudding inside, rhubarb pies, cherry pies, pies with crisscross slats of crust
on top. Pies from the church, pies from my mother’s quilting group, pies from
the neighbors, pies from the aunts. Pies lined the kitchen counter, pies packed
the freezer. Holy pies, pies with painkiller filling, herbal pies, prayer pies,
pies that kept vigil, pies brimming with novenas, pies full of secrets that
even doctors don’t know, magic spell pies, smooth soothing pies overflowing
with the music of rainforests, pies made from circles of light, pies with
halos.
-- Denise Duhamel
“Healing Pies” from
Ka-Ching! $14.95 • 96 pp. © 2009 University of
Pittsburgh Press
Also by Denise Duhamel from
the Pitt Poetry Series:
Queen for a Day $14.00
Two and Two $14.00
American Poetry Now (ed. Ed Ochester) features poems by Denise Duhamel, and many others from the Pitt Poetry
Series.
