{"id":2808,"date":"2019-08-29T19:46:38","date_gmt":"2019-08-29T19:46:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/?page_id=2808"},"modified":"2019-08-29T23:21:58","modified_gmt":"2019-08-29T23:21:58","slug":"berkowitz","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/berkowitz\/","title":{"rendered":"Berkowitz"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\tIn My Little Book of Things I Write Down\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 Bryce Berkowitz<\/em><\/p>\n

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for and after Mary Ann Samyn<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n

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Here\u2019s a toaster. Here\u2019s a dress.
\nThe ribbon I think matters.
\nLet\u2019s begin here.
\nThis is a question for you, but the rest of you can answer in your hearts.
\nSo much bullshit happens in a day, don\u2019t you think?
\nThere\u2019s a 70\u2019s song for everything.
\nYou tell us a lot, but not everything.
\nShame is good. You can work with that.
\nYou just need to give up a little bit. Giving up is useful sometimes.
\nI don\u2019t like parakeets.
\nDenny\u2019s is a powerful place.
\nYou don\u2019t want to announce honesty. You just do it.
\nDon\u2019t settle. Dreams are tough.
\nPraying is fine. Maybe forgiveness is right.
\nYou can own that word if you want. Pull it behind you in a little wagon.
\nAnd it really turns out you haven\u2019t been loved enough.
\nSometimes half sorry is as sorry as you can be.
\nAll of which is to say,
\nHoney put that pillow down. Put that dirty pillow down.
\nShame is a theme tonight.
\nI don\u2019t think I\u2019d like to know about hydroponics.
\nI don\u2019t really care for modern life.
\nI think little kids are good at burial. They\u2019re low to the ground already.
\nHow is that possible?
\nPigs agree to do a lot of strange things.
\nIs there a classy karaoke? It could happen in winter, I feel.
\nWhat\u2019s the regret here?
\nA useful mystery.
\nYour material will run out and then the only thing you\u2019ll have left
\nis what the rest of us have: a sunny day.
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\tWe Do What We Do\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 Bryce Berkowitz<\/em><\/p>\n

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I can\u2019t find north in West Virginia.
\nBeneath the pine-shade on Lillian,
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I\u2019ve run the way I\u2019ve always run;
\nthe way anger borders love.
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How the spoon bends a certain way.
\nMaybe I\u2019ll never know what\u2019s right.<\/em>
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Beneath a streetlight, a star trail,
\nsometimes silent is as loud as I can be.
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Poet's Statement: Every year, West Virginia University's MFA program holds a graduation reading for the outgoing cohort. At the 2016 reading, a third-year poet read a poem composed entirely of poetry professor Mary Ann Samyn's quotes during graduate workshop. And each subsequent year at the final reading, another outgoing poet has composed and read a poem made from Mary Ann's quotes during workshop. \"In My Little Book of Things I Write Down\" was my contribution to that tradition from April 2018.
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\n I wrote \"We Do What We Do\" during my last summer in West Virginia, after I graduated, but before I left to teach in Montana. Between May and June, I watched my cohort move away\u2014to Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida, North Carolina, California. In the summer before this, I'd told myself I wouldn't be the last one to leave, but when the time came, lingering in the uncertainty felt meaningful. I often write poems busy with place, but in this poem, I wanted to start with place and go somewhere new.
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\nBio:\u00a0Bryce Berkowitz is the author of Bermuda Ferris Wheel,<\/em> winner of the 42 Miles Press Poetry Award (forthcoming 2020). His writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Best New Poets, New Poetry from the Midwest, The Sewanee Review, Ninth Letter, Nashville Review,<\/em> and other publications. He teaches at Butler University.
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4X2 an online poetry journal Photo by Melissa Hotchkiss In My Little Book of Things I Write Down by Bryce Berkowitz for and after Mary Ann Samyn Here\u2019s a toaster. Here\u2019s a dress. The ribbon I think matters. Let\u2019s begin here. This is a question for you, but the rest of you can answer in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"full-width-page.php","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2808","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2808","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\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2808"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2808\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2854,"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2808\/revisions\/2854"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}