{"id":11632,"date":"2021-06-03T22:51:51","date_gmt":"2021-06-03T22:51:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/?p=11632"},"modified":"2021-06-03T22:51:53","modified_gmt":"2021-06-03T22:51:53","slug":"six-poems-nathaniel-bek","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/?p=11632","title":{"rendered":"SIX POEMS – Nathaniel Bek"},"content":{"rendered":"

ST\u00d6RRISCH<\/strong>
\n 
\nMy art teacher once said
\n“The clay is as it was born”
\n 
\nAnd I think of my mother
\nHer spine cradled me into this
\nI accepted welcoming like a common burdock
\nFace full of straw burs
\nI was born sunny side up, hard against the back
\nTo this day she has never broken
\nThe silence of how she has labored me
\n 
\nAnd I am as the seed is to earth
\nA restless palm reaching for the air
\nA broken shell of a good living
\nA stubborn massing of roots
\nOr that of my mother’s will
\nA happening anthology of chances
\nThat finally stayed
\n 
\nMy mother tells me of a sister never born
\nAnd I am born again
\nA bundle of lashes, hair, and smiles
\nTwenty-four hours of unrest wrapping a father\u2019s finger
\nI was unbending enough to arrive
\nHere like an unfurled bow
\nA present that has been asked for again
\nBut what open lung has not asked for the same
\n 
\nIs this what keeps me, or
\n 
\nAm I too afraid to return
\nTo everything I have ever called home
\nLeaving and returning can sound the same
\nI too am the clay as it was born
\nA thing of the earth too estranged to stay here
\n <\/p>\n

\n

 
\nMOVING ON<\/strong>
\n 
\n\u201cI have dug an organ from under the basement\u201d\u2013 Irina Bogomolova,
\n\u201cThey Will Not Bleed for Us\u201d<\/p>\n

Dad,<\/p>\n

The stains don\u2019t wash off the way they used to
\nBut a tremble in my hand still shakes the water free
\nI don\u2019t think I will ever find an apology down here
\nJust old containers filled with a person I barely knew
\nUnboxing this can feel like clemency if I let it
\nBut where do we put the body when we\u2019re done
\n <\/p>\n

\n

 
\nTHE NIGHT BARKS BACK<\/strong>
\n 
\nSnip the snarl leaving the claws where they tremble
\nThere is no room for rumble and gnashing
\nLet the wild run out of you like a loose tongue
\nSmile; and breathe deep with your bones
\nLike the body hasn\u2019t experienced this attention before
\nAnxious is the power that calls the wicked out of you
\nLeave the blood on the canines this time
\nDo not fear the sound of your own voice
\nFace found in the oven of this heat
\nSpeak with your teeth and let your fur stand for you
\nEven when you are tired
\nLet the meal leave you hungry
\nDon\u2019t give into this and all that rests behind the door
\nLeave it
\nAnd let it be what it\u2019s always been
\nUnknown
\nBut try not to chase the footsteps that haunt the night
\nTry not to feel the rippling tide of muscle that
\nCalls your senses to lament
\nThis can be an open window with a good breeze
\nIf you lean into the glass
\nAnd let your eyes chase the things that escape in the trees
\n <\/p>\n

\n

 
\nLUCID<\/strong>
\n 
\nA story is just a collection of dead trees that
\nWe never let the earth keep
\nBut what good is rich soil when we’re poor
\nOn loving our dirty hands
\n 
\n                         We had enough for the children we hadn’t had
\n                             In the mornings we never shared the covers
\n        Never let the cold bite us before the dawn shook our eyes open
\n                               We never knew a splinter of a frame
\n             Just little words nestled between box springs and backboards
\n                                        That kept us up all night
\n 
\nI keep finding us under my fingernails
\nA cold bed side and rustled covers
\nI should have slept in
\n 
\nThe morning isn’t anything but a full throat
\nToo dry to recite our dreams
\nOr a barren meadow we keep trying
\nto yield conversations of the night from
\n 
\nBut sometimes it is a pair of eyes
\nThat haven’t woken up yet
\nA fearful breath on the downward whirl
\nOf a rollercoaster
\n 
\nLife is just as hard to live as it is to love and
\nSometimes life is a percussion of atoms
\nColliding in a crescendo of mathematical chaos
\n 
\nAnd sometimes it is us
\n       Joinery is just the act of marrying two pieces of wood
\n 
\nThat is what I would say if I knew how to ask you
\n 
\nWe are just a collection of stories that
\nHaven’t found our way back to the ground yet
\n <\/p>\n

\n

 
\nODE TO THE MAN I AM TODAY<\/strong>
\n 
\n         If I shave, the razor will be sharp enough to cut the past from my body this time. Make a clean face of all my bad decisions till I can look at myself in the mirror again. I have learned to make tattoos of my scars. An art piece for the truth that is overcoming. There are so many impossibilities to make possible if you breathe them in. If you exhale expectations till your body remembers promise. There is no road to follow here: just dirty hands, feet, and a lot of blood I left behind.
\nI have learned to love painting the ground with failures again. Learned to let my heart speak for when my throat is full of ears. It is so easy to say the things you want to hear, but harder to live out the ones you don\u2019t. I have made a bed of forgiveness, even when I do not sleep in it. On the worst days when the lights dim enough to make the night rest inside of me, I have learned that some birds sing at 3:00 am. The world can sound like an orchestra in autumn or just the falling of acorns. Silence is as beautiful as it needs to be, and I have learned to make my bed with a sheet set of insomnia. I no longer need to pull the blinds on my eyelids with bottle caps. These days I rest with a heartbeat that is more restless than mine. I drank down love in a bar and have been hung over heels for her ever since. I have learned to make things with my hands again, even when I am afraid, they will be too fragile to hold on to. I have learned to be fragile. Patience is something I still wait for on occasion. But some things are just not worth waiting for. Sometimes the sky cracks the clouds open long enough to think the weather mastered perfection. Other times it is just her smile. Luck is not something I would gamble on, but I would make a full house out of this. With nothing to lose but everything. I can only be all that has made me. Two tired hands and a dream for something more.
\n <\/p>\n

\n

 
\nDARE TO BE<\/strong>
\n 
\nIf we let the past
\nIt would run time like leaves
\nMake maple of our blood and
\nStir our nostrils wild
\nPancakes and good jazz on Sunday morning
\nWe would be like we were always meant to
\n 
\nThis is an ode to you
\nAnd us
\nTo all the people who ever laughed louder than the sky
\nWho made hopscotch of puddles
\nThis is for the dreamers that still converse with the night
\nFor the ones who make a home out of anything
\nFor the treetop in all of us that still reaches for the sun
\nLet\u2019s make a miracle sound like our own again
\nReimagine the things we made of the clouds
\nThen dare to do it all again
\n 
\n 
\n\"\"Nathaniel  Bek is a writer, artist, and activist originally from Wisconsin. He was selected Editor\u2019s Choice for poetry in Phoenix – Art & Literary Magazine, and was a semifinalist for Eber & Wien. Several of the poems have been published in Narrative Northeast.<\/em> He has competed nationally for Spoken Word at the National Poetry Slam and Individual World Poetry Slam. He was the organizer, and host of \u201cGet Lit,\u201d a literary series that was nominated for Best of Orlando. Nathaniel also assists with various youth programs in the Orlando area where he currently resides. He can be found on all social media at NCBEK Poetry.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ST\u00d6RRISCH   My art teacher once said “The clay is as it was born”   And I think of my mother Her spine cradled me into this I accepted welcoming like a common burdock Face full of straw burs I was born sunny side up, hard against the back To this day she has never [&hellip<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11674,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[368],"class_list":["post-11632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poetry","tag-le-somnambule-by-marc-chagall"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11632","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11632"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11632\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11681,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11632\/revisions\/11681"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11674"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}