{"id":2249,"date":"2014-06-30T10:19:38","date_gmt":"2014-06-30T10:19:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/?p=2249"},"modified":"2014-09-07T13:51:06","modified_gmt":"2014-09-07T13:51:06","slug":"2249","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/?p=2249","title":{"rendered":"Gone the Body, Its Accessories – Rigoberto Gonzalez"},"content":{"rendered":"

Shower in the dark, a fleeting<\/p>\n

flash of phosphorescence–a jellyfish<\/p>\n

glowing in the depths of the sea. Reach<\/p>\n

for it. The smoke of light<\/p>\n

shrinks away. Ghost of a face,<\/p>\n

ghost of a man who left<\/p>\n

a ghost-kiss on the glass–<\/p>\n

only proof of touch,<\/p>\n

only trace of theft.<\/p>\n

Gone the body, its accessories:<\/p>\n

musk, salt, and breath–<\/p>\n

the bell of the throat, wiry<\/p>\n

lotus at the base of the spine.<\/p>\n

And you, empty<\/p>\n

cage that has lost its bird,<\/p>\n

at night, the squeaking<\/p>\n

of a tiny metal swing<\/p>\n

makes you long for song.<\/p>\n

You say his name<\/p>\n

You say his name<\/p>\n

You say his name<\/p>\n

and the last part you possess<\/p>\n

of him now dissipates. The moon,<\/p>\n

she bows to you–she\u2019s seen fugitives<\/p>\n

evade recapture when the mouth<\/p>\n

doesn\u2019t seal like stone, suspend<\/p>\n

the letters of a name like fireflies in amber.
\nBut yes, this letting go the dead. And yes, relief.<\/p>\n

 
\n <\/p>\n

\"nn, Rigoberto Gonz\u00e1lez is the author of thirteen books of poetry and prose, his most recent title is the poetry volume Unpeopled Eden. He is the recipient of Guggenheim and NEA fellowships, winner of the American Book Award, The Poetry Center Book Award, The Shelley Memorial Award of The Poetry Society of America, a grant from the New York Foundation for the Arts, and a Lambda Literary Award. He is contributing editor for Poets & Writers Magazine, on the executive board of directors of the National Book Critics Circle, and is professor of English at Rutgers-Newark, the State University of New Jersey.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Shower in the dark, a fleeting flash of phosphorescence–a jellyfish glowing in the depths of the sea. Reach for it. The smoke of light shrinks away. Ghost of a face, ghost of a man who left a ghost-kiss on the glass– only proof of touch, only trace of theft<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2347,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[99,51,98],"class_list":["post-2249","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poetry","tag-fireflies","tag-photo","tag-yumi-cyan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2249","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=2249"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2249\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2345,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2249\/revisions\/2345"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2347"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}