{"id":6463,"date":"2019-12-23T19:35:38","date_gmt":"2019-12-23T19:35:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/?p=6463"},"modified":"2019-12-29T19:46:00","modified_gmt":"2019-12-29T19:46:00","slug":"3-poems-chelsea-dingman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/?p=6463","title":{"rendered":"3 POEMS – Chelsea Dingman"},"content":{"rendered":"

A MEMORY OF WATER<\/strong>
\n 
\nIt rains because another body has fled
\nits wounds. It rains because morning is sick
\nwith drought. It rains because only water
\nhas memory. It rains & someone\u2019s husband
\nor mother or brother has become the past
\nparticiple of love. It rains because we must be present
\nwhen the world disappears behind cloud. It rains
\nbecause we look for our mothers under clotheslines & beds,
\nnestled inside the throats of birds, as we mother the rain
\nthat wants to bury itself below ground, as we mother
\nthought & not deed, our gods pulsing like a murder
\nof crows at a firing squad ceremony. It rains again,
\nnow, because the trees want to feel anything
\nnew. It rains because blood stirs under the surface
\nof ash. It rains because sadness wants to be
\nrepealed, as the fires we burn become the future.
\nIt rains because silence is the circus we give our children,
\nwhile we pray to sorrow to take away the rain
\nsplitting our throats. It rains because everything
\nfallen once knew joy. It rains because water wants
\nto originate anywhere but sky as sky breaks
\nopen inside us. It rains because we can\u2019t stop
\nbecoming this world when we are lonely.
\n <\/p>\n

\n

 
\nAFTER YOU ALMOST DIED THE FIRST TIME<\/strong>
\n 
\nI called your name to hear
\na voice like yours echo
\nin the rime. I called myself back
\n 
\nfrom the lure of a man\u2019s hands, the beggar
\nmoon caught in my throat.
\nI called you mother. Not Mama.
\n 
\nNot Mom. I created distance
\nin that one word. The hull
\n& husk of your lung, spooned out.
\n 
\nLobe by lobe, I called breath
\nan enemy. I was called orphan
\nby agencies. My father, already dead,
\n 
\nas you raised us alone. I called you hero
\nfor awhile, then whore. Then leaf
\nthat can\u2019t return to the tree. Or maybe
\n 
\nthat was me. I called the days grey
\nhorses. I called it love
\nwhen moss overran the pines.
\n 
\nI called you through this animal
\nloneliness. I called you someone
\nI didn\u2019t want to be. I called you, yesterday,
\n 
\nto wish you a good day. The sparrows,
\nforgetting themselves in the glare
\nof the windows. I called the day
\n 
\nforward to fold over our voices.
\nI called to say love is evidence
\nof all that you\u2019ve kept alive.
\n <\/p>\n

\n

 
\nINDUCTION<\/strong>
\n 
\nToday, a daughter will come,
\npale & unprotected,
\n 
\nto make me possible.
\n 
\nI will be ruled by no other god
\nbut time.
\n <\/p>\n

Chelsea Dingman is the author of Thaw<\/i> (University of Georgia Press, 2017),<\/div>\n
What Bodies Have I Moved <\/i>(Madhouse Press, 2018) and a forthcoming book of poems, Through a Small Ghost <\/i>(University of Georgia Press, 2020)<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A MEMORY OF WATER   It rains because another body has fled its wounds. It rains because morning is sick with drought. It rains because only water has memory. It rains & someone\u2019s husband or mother or brother has become the past participle of love. It rains because we must be present when the world [&hellip<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2990,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6463","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6463","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=6463"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6463\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6705,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6463\/revisions\/6705"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2990"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}