{"id":3153,"date":"2020-09-10T23:30:23","date_gmt":"2020-09-10T23:30:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/?page_id=3153"},"modified":"2020-09-10T23:30:23","modified_gmt":"2020-09-10T23:30:23","slug":"herr","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/herr\/","title":{"rendered":"Herr"},"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>
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\tPhoto by Melissa Hotchkiss\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\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\tRepetition ritual for summoning the good witch\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 KT Herr<\/em><\/p>\n

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

          On a large screen I watch ice-
\n                              fisted hail shatter a windshield. Something about storm
\n                                        footage gets the beams of my body
\nhot. Thrumming. Like they could lift
\n                              & land in some swifter place. Later, a real storm
<\/p>\n

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

     tramples Florida. The air conditioner
\n                              exhales to a halt, then clears
\n          its throat coming back on. Between its purrs & gurgles
\n                                                                           I\u2019m itching for a pattern
<\/p>\n

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

     I can touch. I twist the blinds closed
\n                       & open again. Fingers of my left hand calloused
\n                            from someone else\u2019s chords. Think: I must be waiting
\n                                                for a sign. Something about joy
<\/p>\n

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

          makes me foolish, lets me believe in nonsense
\n                                                        like destiny. Diet pills. Stimulus
\n                                              packages. I go & go
<\/p>\n

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

     out into summer\u2019s wet
\n             pulse, where geckos can\u2019t quiet
\n                                              their ode. I return & return. Songs earned
\n                                       & thieved dwell in my hands, my throat; then scatter
\n          like leaves to line the walk. Something\u2026
\n                                                maybe when in the act of opening
<\/p>\n

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

           my door I pause, expecting a cat
\nwho\u2019s not there to badger out. A sign of what? I made story
\n                                                from dream, brought love\u2019s stink
\n                                                                                            like a bad witch
\n                                                               with me in the gale. The cat
\n<\/p>

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

           is back in Michigan. Maybe he sleeps
\n                                                on top of her. The symphony of frogs
\n                                     will not abate. Diligent spiders try & try
\n                                to dress me in their silks. Night is a feast
\n     of blood aloft on tiny wings, & she is
\n                                  eaten from me. Before I ever
\n<\/p>

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

                   fell in love, I wrote a song
\n                                               whose chorus went: come out, come out, <\/em>
\n                               wherever you are<\/em>. I was channeling
<\/p>\n

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

     the good witch. I need her pink
\n                                         benevolence; her snow, chilling my heavy-
\n                         lidded poppies. I trim
\n                                         my nails, clunk sodden heels, wonder if I\u2019m
\n                                                                                  awake. Wonder which fold to pinch
\n                                                  to send this body home.
<\/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<\/ul>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>

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Poet's Statement: This poem arrived last summer during a residency at the Atlantic Center for the Arts. Cornelius Eady, our mentoring artist, urged us to consider collaboration, hybridity, overlap, and poetry-as-song. I was falling in love while also, still, for a long time, out of love. My body hadn\u2019t spoken to me for a while and I struggled to listen. The air; the insects; the storm-thrashed foliage; the Oz-like dreaminess of the Florida bush all collaborated in a sort of attempted translation. Then I translated their translation into this poem.<\/p>\n

Bio:\u00a0KT Herr (she\/her) is a queer poet, songwriter, and curious person whose poetry is published or forthcoming in Frontier, Quarter After Eight, Dream Pop<\/em>, and others. She currently lives in Oak Bluffs, MA, where she teaches remote poetry classes, flirts with neighborhood skunks, and regularly sharpens her kitchen knives.<\/strong>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

4X2 an online poetry journal Photo by Melissa Hotchkiss Repetition ritual for summoning the good witch by KT Herr           On a large screen I watch ice-                               fisted hail shatter a windshield. Something about storm                                         footage gets the beams of my body hot. Thrumming. Like they could lift                               & land in some swifter place. Later, a…<\/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-3153","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3153","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=3153"}],"version-history":[{"count":26,"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3153\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3181,"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3153\/revisions\/3181"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/barrowstreet.org\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}