WEBVTT

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Now, taking those
windows and getting

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serious about thinking about
where I could write myself down

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meant considering some
of the options for what

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could be the writing surface.

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Should it be the skin,
paper, canvas, glass, marble?

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What are some of the
surface possibilities?

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And so this one took a deep
look at photographic processes,

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writing after a photograph
by Edward Steichen

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called Heavy Roses.

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The poem takes its title
from the photograph.

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And when there's
an "I" in the poem,

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it's imagining that the
photographer is thinking

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or speaking, mostly thinking.

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So I'd like to read this.

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Again, this book has a number
of long sequences that --

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they're a place to
work on extended wings,

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as Wallace Stevens once said.

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So, "Heavy Roses."

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"One, 2:00 in the afternoon,
the village florist cellar.

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Two, in tubs cool on the floor,
three or four shades to a tub.

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Three, they have no mirror.

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They have to ask.

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For am I damask or an
older woman's blush?

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And I have, five, some
yellow ones in the back,

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shopgirl says.

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Six, am I the crimson
of veinal blood?

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Seven, or more
like arterial blood

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shouted on a suicide sleeve?

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Eight, no, no, I say, I'm
confused enough as it is.

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Nine, am I simply unsatisfied?

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10, or truly insatiable as I
have been accused of being?

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11, I am drawn to these, I say.

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12, and I watch the shadow
of my own hand hover.

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To be thumbing your
heart to get that drunk.

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Rainless night in
Voulangis, full bloom."

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