[WSH: I take full responsibility for my freelancer’s violation of Blogtown’s no-poetry rule, even if it is a sad poem about dead cats—AH]
Tonight if you stop by the Together Gallery (2916 NE Alberta Street, Suite A) at 6 p.m. you’ll be treated to music (by AND AND AND), food and booze, and a multi-media presentation by poet Jacqueline Suskin, celebrating her debut book, The Collected, just out from Publication Studio.
I haven’t had a chance to read the book but the sample poem is pretty great. Support your local poetry community and have fun in the meantime!
We stole the lemons for the cats
cause we found the tom-tabby’s spent body
in Mr. Elmond’s poppy bed, bones all white-tipped
and forgotten. Got thick citrus yellow under
our nails juicing the fruit all over that mouser’s
old joints and didn’t kneel in our suits, price tags
still on for good measure. Dressed up to head out,
canned green beans and sweet yams in brown bags,
Sunday shoes as leaving shoes. We stationed
the skull above ground to protect the kittens
and lady-cats he left behind, a grave marker,
a watchman to remain where we could not.—Jacqueline Suskin, from The Collected