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The mother’s song is
the sound of the boot
compressing the snow
the sound of the bayonet
stabbing a bale of hay
the sound of a gunshot
behind the barn
the sound of a spade
edging into dry earth
the sound of a prayer
muttered by the doomed
penitent hiding behind
a curtain his mouth
taped shut his thumbs
cut off and a hole in
his throat through which
a thrush reaches out
a worm in its beak
blind and twisted
as an ampersand
a child practiced
over and over
in a black book
as punishment for
daring to imagine
the mother’s song
that’s written on torn
white wings from
the other side
of understanding
where everything
has a way of breathing
and everything
is as wondrous as
waking up in rags
on a forest floor
realizing that no one
survived not even
those who live.
Henry Israeli’s poetry collections are god’s breath hovering across the waters, (Four Way Books: 2016), Praying to the Black Cat (Del Sol: 2010), and New Messiahs (Four Way Books: 2002). He is also the translator of three books by Albanian poet Luljeta Lleshanaku. He is Associate Professor of English and Director of the Drexel Writing Festival at Drexel University in Philadelphia.
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Poetry
in your carpeted office you lay my life down / and say open up to that small room in my sternum.
In his new book, the former Fed chair cuts through economic orthodoxy on central banking. But he fails to reckon deeply with its political consequences.
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