{"id":2045,"date":"2018-08-19T17:50:37","date_gmt":"2018-08-19T17:50:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/?page_id=2045"},"modified":"2018-08-22T18:03:55","modified_gmt":"2018-08-22T18:03:55","slug":"beeson","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/beeson\/","title":{"rendered":"Beeson"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t4X2\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

\n\t\t\t\t\t\tan online poetry journal\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/h2>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t<\/span>\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\tCoup de Foudre\t\t\t\t\t<\/h5>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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by Miranda Beeson<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

Did you lose your keys?<\/em> I say
Rolling down my car window
On a wild windy mid-June day
By the bay. White caps, the bridge
& you. Talk about cinematic.
Why do you look just like John
\nSlattery in Mad Men? All cropped
\nWhite hair & vigor? Can I say\u2014
\nYou are life force made flesh?
\nYour stunned expression stuns
\nMe right back. A woman drives
\nBy & rectifies the wreckage of
\nYour day. What are the odds?
\n(Your black credit card too...)
\nI say I knew it was you<\/em>, not
\nKnowing why, but knowing
\nI knew. The magnetic field of
\nFeeling\u2014the absence of thought.
\nI found them washed up on
\nThe beach. Down there. Where
\nI live. Follow me.<\/em> And you do.
\nA strange intimacy\u2014watching
\nHappiness fracture the face of
\nA man you just met. Its naked
\nBeauty. I hand you your keys
\n& card\u2014keys worn & warm,
\nCard sleek & hard. We are palm
\nTo palm. Pull me through the
\nWords of the world where words
\nMatter. Sever the slice of late
\nAfternoon sun that falls between
\nUs. Let me slip out of my skin.
\nSlip into yours.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/li>\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t<\/span>\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t

\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\tThe Smith's Tale\t\t\t\t\t<\/h5>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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by Miranda Beeson<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

In the low shadowed corner
\nof my mid-winter 3 a.m. room
\nstands a sad hulk of a man
\nhump-shouldered & silent.
\n<\/span>\n\nHis stiff sooty clothes
\nlayered like shingles on
\nthe house of his soul. The
\nblacksmith\u2019s apprentice\u2014
\n\n<\/span>\n\nhis molten days flowing
\none through the next in
\na succession of horse shoes
\n& hitching posts, hammers
\n\n<\/span>\n\n& tongs. A solitary spirit who
\nhas refused to leave this 18th<\/sup>
\nC. smithy, currently the house
\nof my 21st century friends.
\n\n<\/span>\n\nI have had such visitations
\nbefore. Fright does not factor
\nin, only a palpable curiosity\u2014
\nwhy a weight won\u2019t lift.
\n\n<\/span>\n\nYou have seen it, I\u2019m sure.
\nThe last fierce struggle
\nfollowed by an ascension
\n\u2014the relief in the room\u2014
\n\n<\/span>\n\na body turning the color
\nof clay, the eyes dim pools\u2014
\nbut such a lift, shift in the air\u2014
\nlike a longed-for breeze.
\n\n<\/span>\n\nHe regards me, hooded brow,
\nblack eyes, this neanderthal,
\nall spite and sorrow\u2014a plea
\nfor help made flesh.
\n\n<\/span>\n\nBlacksmith heal thyself<\/em>
\nI say. I am busy carrying
\nmy own weights, measuring
\nout my own molten days.
\n\n<\/span>\n\nEither hammer the iron
\nor lie flat on the anvil, waiting
\nto be struck. Smite those
\nchains\u2014link by link.
<\/p>\n\n<\/span>\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/li>\n\n\t<\/ul>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>

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Poet's Statement: The blacksmith in \u201cThe Smith\u2019s Tale\u201d was as described in the poem: a visitation (not a dream) in the corner of my bedroom in an 18th century house that belongs to friends of mine in Leverett, Massachusetts. Their house was indeed a smithy way back when. The poem arrived ten years after the event, while I was pondering why some spirits seem to let go of this life with such ease, and others remain so stubborn\u2014refusing to let go. (I never slept in that bedroom again.)<\/p>\n<\/span>\n

We go through periods of our lives where visceral desire is unknown to us\u2014then, when least expected, we find ourselves in its presence again. \"Coup de Foudre\" was such a moment. I am reminded of the lines from Stanley Kunitz\u2019s poem \u201cTouch Me:\u201d \u201cWhat makes the engine go? \/ Desire, desire, desire. \/ The longing for the dance \/ stirs in the buried life.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/span>\n

Bio:\u00a0Miranda Beeson is the recipient of the 2017 Jody Donohue Poetry Prize. New poems can be found in The Southampton Review, The Laurel Review<\/em> and Badlands<\/em>. Her chapbook Ode to the Unexpected<\/em> is available from Shrinking Violet Press. She has been awarded several New York State Council on the Arts Grants for teaching a generation of young poets. Currently happily at work on a manuscript of poems, WILDLIFE<\/em>, she is an MFA candidate at Stony Brook Southampton.<\/p>\n<\/span>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

4X2 an online poetry journal Coup de Foudre by Miranda Beeson Did you lose your keys? I say Rolling down my car window On a wild windy mid-June day By the bay. White caps, the bridge & you. Talk about cinematic. Why do you look just like John Slattery in Mad Men? All cropped White…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"full-width-page.php","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2045","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2045"}],"version-history":[{"count":41,"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2045\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2185,"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2045\/revisions\/2185"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}