I'm starting something new today. I'm going to make The Man with the Blue Guitar, among the many things it already does, a showcase for Visual Poetry. And by "showcase" I mean not just my poems but the poems of other people.
Okay, the debut VisPo video is Ren Powell's "Immigrants."
ImmigrantsA poem by Ren Powell
There are fish swimming just above my ceiling
under the feet of the tenants on the second floor
I can hear them swirling the water
with each thrust of a fin, with each
slap of a gill, I can guess they aren't big
probably the size of pennies
copper, green and orange
but making a lot of noise
And sometimes the tenants upstairs
clog in Appalachian fashion
and the fish get really pissed-off
and whisk up a buzz about it — to each other
but I can hear them.
They say, "Jesus Christ,
I can't believe I left the Amazon
for this."From Powell's Thanks for the Cornflakes,
a bilingual book forthcoming from
Wigestrand Publishers in Norway.
Ren Powell is "a writer, translator and poet — a native Californian living on the west coast of Norway since 1992. She is the author of three full collections of poetry and has eleven books of translation to her credit. Her own poetry has been translated and published in six languages" (http://www.renpowell.com). Part of what makes this poem fascinating is the fact that Ren Powell is herself an immigrant. Check out Ren's website to learn about her work in human rights and social justice.
Posts
2 comments:
There are fish swimming just above my ceiling
under the feet of the tenants on the second floor
I can hear them swirling the water
with each thrust of a fin.. Massage therapy Mississauga
The Man with the Blue Guitar, among the many things it already does, a showcase for Visual Poetry. electric bike canada
Post a Comment