In the Lateness of the World
Page 5
light and the reverse of light
terror as walking blind along the breaking sea, body in whom I lived
the not-yet of death darkening what it briefly illuminates
an unknown place as between languages
back and forth, breath to breath as a calm
in the surround rises, fireflies in lindens, an ache of pine
you have yourself within you
yourself, you have her, and there is nothing
that cannot be seen
open then to the coming of what comes
DEDICATIONS AND NOTES
The title of this collection is from Robert Duncan’s poem “Poetry, a Natural Thing.”
“Museum of Stones” is in memory of Hugh Anthony Sloan, 1953–2007.
“Exile,” “Fisherman,” and “For Ilya at Tsarskoye Selo” are for Ilya Kaminsky.
“The Lost Suitcase,” “Last Bridge,” and “Elegy for an Unknown Poet” are in memory of Daniel Simko, 1959–2004, poet and translator of Georg Trakl.
“The Refuge of Art” is for Ashley Ashford-Brown.
“A Room” is in memory of Robert Creeley, who gave us the glass cubes. Chapter titles are from David Hume.
“The Ghost of Heaven” and “Ashes to Guazapa” are in memory of Leonel Gómez, 1939–2009.
“Hue: From a Notebook” is for Kevin Bowen, Bruce Weigl, Nguyen Ba Chung, and Larry Heinemann.
“A Bridge”: A bothy is a ruined hut restored for use by trekkers and fishermen.
“The End of Something” is for Lise Goett.
“Lost Poem” is for Lars Gustaf Andersson.
“Theologos”: Archilochus was a Greek lyric poet from the island of Paros, 680–645 BC. This poem is for Stamatis Kouzis of Thassos.
“Toward the End” is for Eryk Hanut.
“What Comes” is for Barbara Cully.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
With gratitude to the editors of the following publications, in which these poems first appeared: Boston Review, Kenyon Review, The Nation, The New Yorker, Poetry, Poetry International, Poetry London, Salmagundi, Provincetown Arts, Best American Poetry, and World Literature Today. Broadsides of “Museum of Stones,” “What Comes,” and “Light of Sleep” were published by Folger Shakespeare Library, the Rose O’Neill Literary House, Kore Press, and the Jack Sinclair Letterpress Lab at the University of Arizona, respectively.
Dedicated to my father, Michael Joseph Sidlosky, and my mother, the late Louise Blackford Sidlosky (1926–2013).
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Carolyn Forché is an American poet, translator, and memoirist. Her books of poetry are Blue Hour, The Angel of History, The Country Between Us, and Gathering the Tribes. Her memoir, What You Have Heard Is True, was published by Penguin Press in 2019. In 2013, Forché received the Academy of American Poets Fellowship given for distinguished poetic achievement. In 2017, she became one of the first two poets to receive the Windham-Campbell Prize. She is a University Professor at Georgetown University. She lives in Maryland with her husband, photographer Harry Mattison.
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