POETRY MONDAY: KAREN CHASE

POETRY MONDAY: KAREN CHASE

 Karen Chase

Some of you may have already encountered the poems of Karen Chase.  Her poems have appeared in magazines such as The New Yorker, The Gettysburg Review  and The New Republic, in the Norton anthologies Introduction to Literature and Introduction to Poetry,  in Billy Collins’ Poetry 180, and in two collections, Kazimierz Square and Bear. In 2007, however, she published a different kind of book – one that may be of special interest to readers of this publication.  The non-fiction Land of Stone: Breaking Silence through Poetry  (Wayne State University Press) is Chase’s account of two years during the decade she spent as Poet-in-Residence at a large psychiatric hospital outside of New York City.   Working one-on-one with a young man who refused to talk, she developed a technique that helped him break through his silence and begin to write poetry.  A gifted, intuitive teacher, she never violated her student’s privacy or dignity, nor did she overstep and confuse her role with that of the clinicians who were working with him in other ways.  Her technique, “I write a line/you write a line,” emphasized craft.  Pupil-teacher communication was about such things as metaphor and musicality. Remembering her own struggle to walk again when her legs were paralyzed from childhood polio helped her to do what she had to do to help her student.  Many of the poems they wrote together are included in this remarkable, sensitive and loving book, which was named the Bronze Medal winner of the 2008 Independent Publishers’ Book Award. 

Here, for our December offering, are three of  Karen Chase’s own poems.

 

                                                                                        Irene Willis

                                                                                        Poetry Editor

THREE POEMS BY KAREN CHASE
                                           

                                                      This Can Happen When You’re Married
                                           

                                             You find blue sheets the color of sky with
                                            the feel of summer, they smell like clothes
                                            drying on the line when you were small.
                                            They feel unusual on your skin; you and your
                                            husband sleep on them.

                                            You find thick white towels that absorb a lot   
                                            of water.  When you come from the bath, you are
                                            cold for a moment, you think of snow for a moment,
                                            you wrap yourself in a towel, dry off the water.

                                            Now, you unpack your silver, after years, polish it,
                                            set it in red quilted drawers your mother
                                            lined for you when you were young.

                                            You and your husband are in bed.  The windows are open.
                                            There is a smell from the lawn.  It’s dark and late.  You
                                            and your husband are in the sheets.  He is like a horse.

                                            You are like grass he is grazing, you are his field.  Or
                                            he’s a cow in a barn, licking his calf.  It’s raining out.

                                            He gets up, walks to the other room.  You listen
                                            for his step, his breath.  It is late.  For moments
                                            before you sleep, you hear him singing.

                                            He comes to bed.  He touches your face.  He touches
                                            your skin and lips.  Later, he tells you this  He puts
                                            his head on your breast.  You are dreaming of Rousseau
                                            now, paintings of girls and deserts and lions.         

                           
                                                                (from Kazimierz Square.  CavanKerry Press, Ltd., 2000)

 

                                                  

                                                    Vowels
 

                                           “I may lose my sight,” you told my husband
                                           as you watched the Celtics game in the dark bar.
                                           My old doctor, we don’t see each other anymore.

                                           We have no room now where we notice the light,
                                           no window to look at when
                                           we look away, there’s no way
                                           to tell you I love how you say beautiful
                                           the i like a long e.
                                           I’ve been thinking of vowels lately.

                                          There are trees all colors of green this morning,
                                           there’s rain, I hear the e’s and see the greens –
                                           what if you couldn’t see?  I’m listening
                                           to sweet Al Green sing his vowels now, how
                                           they stretch on huuuuuuuuuuuhhh

 
                                                                 (from Kazimierz Square.  CavanKerry Press, Ltd., 2000)

 

                                                  How to Daydream
                                        

                                         Unplug the phone.
                                         Don’t check for messages.
                                         Don’t make a list of who you should call and chores.
                                         Don’t fret whether it’s who or whom.
                                         Was that a mouse?  Don’t put d-Con in the attic.
                                         There’s no bread in the house – forget about lunch.
                                         Don’t consider whether you’ll get a chicken salad sandwich
                                         at the bagel store.
                                         Don’t check your e-mail.
                                         Don’t, when you get an idea … . oh forget it.
                                         I just heard a bird singing.
                                         Is there supposed to be a thunderstorm?
                                         Don’t check the weather channel.
                                         The other day I paid bills, made calls, cleared the decks.
                                         This room is cold now – I’ll turn the heat up.
                                         Don’t look up daydreaming to see what it makes you think
                                         of.
                                         Meditation.  Don’t call a friend to find out
                                         how to start meditating.  Meditation    Once
                                         there was
                                         a lost
                                         soldier who
                                         wandered into a
                                         cathedral.
                                         His cap on, he had crossed the
                                         trolley tracks, walked along
                                         a river.  Music tugged at
                                         him to go to a mikvah
                                         to chant, and praise
                                         the ammunition but a sign
                                         said Prohibited.
                                         I cannot tell you the time of day, nor what
                                         the light was like, I cannot say whether it was
                                         midmorning or late, or even what country it was.
                                         I cannot even tell you that there was a beautiful beach
                                         there.

                                                               (from Bear. CavanKerry Press, Ltd., 2008)