{"id":4925,"date":"2017-07-12T03:14:06","date_gmt":"2017-07-12T03:14:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/?p=4925"},"modified":"2017-07-12T03:14:06","modified_gmt":"2017-07-12T03:14:06","slug":"three-poems-marge-piercy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/?p=4925","title":{"rendered":"THREE POEMS – Marge Piercy"},"content":{"rendered":"

HOTTEST SUMMER ON RECORD HERE<\/strong>
\n 
\nToo many eggplants and no rain
\nin past years we raised just a few
\nthe parsnips withered in the heat
\nat least there are no mosquitoes
\n 
\ngypsy moths ate the trees bare
\nDecember in June. Frass rained
\ndown on us instead of water
\nat night it sometimes fooled us.
\n 
\nmice sneak into the house looking
\nfor water. Grass is dry dandruff
\nhard earth the sun pounds like a drum
\nThis summer sucks
\n 
\nthe energy from us, muscles
\nlimp as the sagging leaves
\nsenators debate climate change
\nthe trees know all about it.
\n <\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

WE THINK WE ARE LESS FOOLISH <\/strong>
\n 
\n\u201cAll things are full of gods\u201dis attributed to Thales, an early
\nGreek philosopher who was the first to predict eclipses.
\n 
\nPerhaps if we could just believe
\nthis, we\u2019d respect the earth more.
\nWe would not frack or poison her
\nsoil and air or set her water on fire.
\n 
\nin general, we lack respect
\neven for each other let alone
\ncats and dogs we execute a million
\nat a time in so called shelters.
\n 
\nWe would not poison bees
\nso agribusiess could make more
\nmoney. We\u2019d shut down nuclear
\nradiation plants before they shut
\n 
\nus down. We\u2019d behave with an eye
\nto future generations How circum-
\nspect we\u2019d be with our huge waste.
\nAll things are far more godly than us.<\/p>\n

  <\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

THE WEATHER CHANNEL FAILS US<\/strong>
\n 
\nLonging for rain, wishing for it:
\nwhen the wind swishes through dry
\nleaves at night I imagine showers.
\n 
\nA month of drought, brown grasses,
\neven the marsh reeds tipped half
\nthe perennials seared to stalks.
\n 
\nDunn\u2019s Run is just a trickle between
\nbanks like sore gums. Pollen loads
\nthe air and we sneeze convulsively,
\n 
\nhumans, dogs and cats all, even
\nfoxes. Crickets like an amateur
\norchestra of slightly offkey piccolos
\n 
\nflourish but birds are thirsty too.
\nThe air smells burnt on parched
\nmornings. Dust\u2019s our changed climate.
\n <\/p>\n

Copyright 2017 Marge Piercy
\n Box 1473, Wellfleet MA 02667
\n hagolem@c4.net
\n 
\nPoet, novelist, and essayist, Marge Piercy was born in Detroit, Michigan, on March 31, 1936. She won a scholarship to the University of Michigan and was the first member of her family to attend college. She subsequently earned a master\u2019s degree from Northwestern University. She has published numerous books of poetry, including Made in Detroit<\/em> (Knopf, 2015), The Crooked Inheritance<\/em> (Knopf, 2013), and The Hunger Moon<\/em>: New and Selected Poems, 1980-2010<\/em> (Knopf, 2012). She is also the author of a collection of essays on poetry, Parti-Colored Blocks for a Quilt<\/em> (1982), and many novels, including Sex Wars: A Novel of Guilded Age New York<\/em> (William Morrow, 2006). Piercy is dedicated to exploring the interstices of ideology and aesthetics by way of Marxist, feminist, and environmentalist strains of thought. \u201cTo name,” she writes, \u201cis not to possess what cannot \/ be owned or even known in the small words \/ and endless excuses of human speech.\u201d She edited the poetry anthology Early Ripening: American Women Poets Now <\/em>(1988), and is currently the poetry editor of Tikkun<\/em>. In 1990 she collaborated with Nell Blaine, a painter, on a book entitled The Earth Shines Secretly: A Book Of Days<\/em>, which featured Piercy\u2019s poetry and Blaine\u2019s artwork. Piercy lives with her husband, writer Ira Wood, in Wellfleet, Massachusetts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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