In the mail, out of the blue, came a copy of Susan Davis’s remarkable volume of poetry, “Gathering Sound” (Fairweather Books 2006), signed by the poet, with a lovely inscription — “with great appreciation for your sensitivity to and joy in good books.”
The poems sing. Here is the beginning and ending of the graceful, gracious “My Husband Saying Kaddish” —
The first time I mistook it for a headache —
his fingers spread across closed eyes,
rocking heel to toe. Moving in close I heard
his prayer, mumbled, foreign, intimate,
between Paul and the forces of celestial nature
that might compel the small boat carrying
his delicate mother and wide-eyed father
across the black river and into heaven. It’s his job,
he does it dutifully. For 11 months and a day
he recites his recommendations: please see
to their safe arrival, there are no better citizens,
what they did for me deserves eternal peace.
* * *
Years ago, my daughter only a set of dividing
cells within me, Paul and I woke up one morning
before dawn in Venice, Italy. In silence we rolled
our bags to the end of a short, empty pier,
shifting our weight as the fog closed in
and the water rang the dockbells. A boat roared
into view. We rode backwards all the way home
(a world away) to the evening fog of West Virginia.
High above the Atlantic, we piled our hands
onto my belly and said our prayer: a child please,
healthy and bright who will love us and care
for us, and we will do our best to lift, to carry
this child across the rising dark water. . .
And here is “Adam Asks a Favor” in its entirety:
Wait, don’t make her yet.
Before she takes the sound
of wind into her mouth,
before her moving shape
shapes my waking, before
her perfect instep marks
this garden’s end, before
my pulse starts its screaming,
I need to ask you this.
I have a feeling. Promise
me she’ll be more flowers
than trees, more fish than sea.
Don’t let her be too much
me or you or the word
that binds us; don’t tell
her our family name. Give
her a voice less certain
than wanting. Curl her hair
as the morning glories curl
each morning. Widen her eyes
but shorten her fingers.
Make sure she understands,
I am the difference. If
you wait to make her while
I sleep you’ll have the best
view of my dream. I want her
to be what I need her to be,
not me, but a picture of me.
The rest of the poems are here. A beautiful book, full of lines of grace and love, by the Winner of the 2005 Rhea & Seymour Gorsline Poetry Competition.
(Hat tip, and thank you, to Alan Croll).