June 28, 2011

Nina Corwin

SPEAKING OF TONGUES

i.
A man with Alzheimer’s says he left
his pants on in the other room. He means
the lights. They need to be turned off.
His son dissects the message
and after cleaning the old man up,
they walk together to the day care center.

ii.
The finely vintaged connoisseur swirls
his Cabernet in a crystal glass. Sips carefully,
distributing so every tastebud
gets a say, then spits out
adjectives like impudent, toasty and
mature despite its youth.

iii.
Consider the downstate pharmacist
who parses Pidgin English
when he travels overseas. Enunciating
loudly to make himself understood.
Back home he speaks in tongues
before a god with no ears.

iv.
The word-muscle is double
jointed. Ties itself in hitch knots, does back
flips on balance beams,
then strays across the median
into oncoming traffic. Syllables like limbs
with compound fractures.

v.
All afternoon, the pair of us
lick envelopes for hungry children
in Sudan. Later, we survey
the versatility of tongues:
our palates piqued with lemon sorbet
and the salt of each other’s skin.

from Rattle #34, Winter 2010
Tribute to Mental Health Professionals

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May 16, 2011

Nina Corwin

UP SHIT’S CREEK WITH NO SENSE OF SMELL

Continue to contaminate your bed, and you will one day suffocate in your own waste.
—Chief Seattle to President Franklin Pierce, 1854

There’s another Ozone Alert in this kiln
of a city. Empty pockets roast
in tenement ovens while ties and twin sets
shiver in unceasing steams of central air.
Forests are dying of thirst. Kindling
for the next six alarm fire. We’re out on a limb,
as always, thinking we’ve got the answer—
cut down the tree by sawing off the branch

we’ve settled on. Wile E. Coyote’s burning
fuel like tomorrow is wearing
a parachute. Chases Roadrunner right
off a cliff. Doesn’t plummet till he looks
down to see the wide nothing below.

We’ll be OK. We won’t look.

from Rattle #26, Winter 2006

__________

Nina Corwin: “Having played jazz guitar for many years, I found my way back to poetry by way of the music and dynamism of the performance poetry scene. A few years later, I moved across the street from the main branch of the Chicago library. Racks and racks of poetry waiting for my eyes and tongue to discover and devour them, a veritable feast! And so I proceed: to eat and to cook, to cook and to eat.” (web)

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