Jeffrey Cyphers Wright: Pick of the Week [ed. Terence Winch]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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“Gone”

 

“Irk” was one of my dad’s favorite words.

Mom liked to pick up on teen lingo.

She said “stuff” was “neat.”

She was a real people person.

She was chiffon and dad was concrete.

I walk in the valley where they met.

I walk in a “marijuana haze” (how

Dad put it) in New York City. He was

a quarter leprechaun. She was half elf.

I caused them both a lot of grief.

Had I shown more love, I’d be less bereft.

I walk in ghost shoes, my words

a threnody belonging to the throng.

My folks stay closer now they’re “gone.”

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Jeffrey Cyphers Wright is a publisher, critic, eco-activist, impresario, singer/songwriter, and artist, best known as a New Romantic, post-surrealist poet. He is author of 17 books of verse, including Blue Lyre from Dos Madres Press and Party Everywhere from Xanadu. Recent poetry is in New American Writing, Sensitive Skin, Stat-O-Rec, Posit, and Big City Lit. Wright formerly ran Cover Magazine for 15 years. He is a Contributing Editor to Local Knowledge Magazine and reading series. He has hosted numerous events in New York at La Mama, KGB Lit Bar, and Howl! Happening. Art and literary criticism appear most recently in ArtNexus and American Book Review. [See Jeffrey Wright's brilliant and silly Pandemic Puppet Jam!]

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                                                                                               R. Crumb. Stoned Agin. 1971  

Comments

[Barbara Hennin]

Beautiful poem. Love it, Jeff! I understand completely. Love you, Barbara

[Clarinda harriss]

Every syllable rings true.

[Elaine Equi]

What a great poem! So moving -- but still fun.

"She was chiffon and dad was concrete."
"He was a quarter/ leprechaun. She was half elf."

Every line is a gem.

[Eileen]

Love this poem. “My folks stay closer now they’re “gone” touched my heart ❤️

[lally]

brilliant and original as always, thanks Jeff for poeming and Terence for posting

[Grace Cavalieri]

How the past aches inside us, but I'll bet they loved you just as they all did with us--

chiffon and cement! Perfect!

[Terence Winch]

Michael---thanks for commenting.

[Dr. Earle Hitchner]

This brilliant, fourteen-line poem (sonnet-like in how it moves and is moving) by Jeffrey Cyphers Wright reveals the private and public side of his grief over the “lot of grief” he “caused” his deceased parents. What child hasn’t had similar feelings about squandered opportunities to convey an apology to parents or tell them they’re loved? Far more than an expression of filial regret, the poem is, in and of itself, a gift from a son whose own gifts include composing verse of lasting impact. It is far more personally affecting than the wonted, full, funeral service recitation of Psalm 23 evoked by Wright in the line “I walk in the valley where they met.” His poetic palette teems with descriptive information delivered with astonishing economy: a mother who was “chiffon” and “half elf”; a father who was “concrete” and “quarter leprechaun.” Toward the end the poet confesses that his “threnody”--the poem serving in one sense as a powerful public song of lamentation--is for the “throng” (us). The slant rhyme of “throng” and “‘gone’” in the final two lines also suggests that the poet’s far deeper memory and missing of his parents will remain out of our reach but will, for him, make them “stay closer.”

A shout-out to Terence Winch for his unerring picks of poems.

[dick Lourie]

I’m impressed with the way the simplicity of the diction and the syntax have such power. Really fine work.

[Terence Winch]

Thanks, Earle, for another amazing mini-essay.

[Peter Bushyeager]

A wonderful poem!

[David Lehman]

Let me add my compliments. I am particularly foind of "a threnody belonging to the throng."

[Peter Kearney]

The poet walks in ghost shoes, so-called because made by a leprechaun, a shoemaker elf, who is both his father and mother. So his parents are always with him, as he walks repeatedly in this lovely poem.

[Vincent Katz]

Terrific poem!! Congrats Jeff - & thank you to Terence for highlighting it.

[Terence Winch]

Thanks for the comment, Vincent.