ON THE FLY - poems by Amy King
“Not many are as scrupulous as King is in steering their poems through the meanders in which feeling and observation push and pull at each other... King is a lyric poet who can pack enormous surprises into concentrated doses... these poems contain single lines so capacious you almost want to stretch out in them and spend the night.†—Barry Schwabsky
“Amy King’s poems think in association, evoking a world familiar but entirely unexpectable. Next to us all this turns and spins: under the veil of hum and drum is the paradise of possibility. This is a poetry of hope for a world shrouded by nearly and almost.†—Charles Bernstein
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Sample poems from ON THE FLY:
PUTTING THE FOREIGN IN PLACE
The truth is, the alien befits us.
Lightning, likewise, draws sound.
We think pale green and grey
will cover these bruises,
cloak or camouflage or whatever it takes
to join a neighbor’s party, pretend we’re one
of them, holding onto daddy’s arm
for the sake of deeper fragilities.
Just beyond his gate, a vintner kicks
the spur of a thieving blue jay.
He has stolen vines upon tendriled vines
I planned to find my way back by.
The remaining wine in my glass
suddenly goes dry. Vanishes.
And if this were a play, I’d be kissing
Mary’s lips by now. At first taste,
a blue streak bleaches the entire sky.
Amy King
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LIP-SYNCHING DAY INTO NIGHT
The day our urgency took flight, I sat handcuffed
in a Brooklyn basement with a flower vase for one,
wooden chairs blocking corner pockets. The game
didn’t hold its usual snapshot flow. On either side
of Sunday, I prefer a tidy room to false prison
walls on postcards, so much so that typing out
your resume, we spoke in sutured tones of local
rivers, of the Hudson and the East, accessorizing
favorites. One doesn’t actually flow, but our guesswork
overlooked the concrete flubs and corked nature spirits.
I noted there are more contests to dream about than
suicides-in-need. You agreed, “All experience is sin.â€
I felt ill prepared, remote in broken hand. She, myself
as third person, entered with the potential of a dirty girl,
who moved us both in sexual directions. By avoiding
clitoral crossings, we exited left. We opened
a modern gymnasium to soothe the bait. The sole ethic
motto lay capsized in birthing rites, “No miracle
required for machinery of body, for skin and touch
to retain her phantom proof.†For instance, the night
the wall stood still as cloning water was Berlin’s
puddle, a tear on the sobbing cheek of our red meat
hearts. We blame such organs for dew the soul
wrests from gravities of tender houselights.
Morning glories keen their Vaseline sweetness.
We drank together in an airtight jar, dabbing at paw
prints left by lives more over than behind us.
Next door, our bodies dined alone. Of course,
the vocals took place in accordions tied neck-to-neck,
triggered words of lip-glossed synapse in burlap.
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** Additional sample poems available by clicking here.
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Check/money order payable to "Michael Steinman" [or cash] -- $10 (includes postage) to:
Michael Steinman/Flux de Bouche
NCC/SUNY English Department
One Education Drive
Garden City, NY 11530
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Flux de Bouche Press
New York
First Edition
Chapbook
46 pages
7.50" x 7.50"
Perfect Binding
© 2006
