Poem of the Week: Sam Taylor

 

Past Tense

In the Great Depression of 2047,

a time of sorrow rivaled only

by the Global Unification Wars

of Spring 2029 to 2033,

in the Merlona Plague of 2104,

in the year of the forest die-off,

after the atmospheric hue reduction,

in the year of the last rebellion,

after the rise of the freeze gun,

after the Earth Liberation Army

went into hiding, after sorrow

was renamed, after the Ethiopians

became immune to cancer-

someone was born, and someone loved

in their names like grass

where the river sleeps

and the sky's tears were

a private thing

touched only in solitude.

And four out of five full bellies believed. 

And nine out of ten hungry mouths agreed.

And the ancient books that had never made sense

made no sense again and at last

ceased to be printed.  And all the words

fell out of the bibles in the night.

The pages were filled with a rain of leaves.

And the words that were left could not be read,

and so they acquired an air of sanctity

which they had never, in truth, possessed

in the daylight in the presence of men.

And someone in a field found an old car

from the year black with beetles, eaten like lace,

and the sky fell into it, a private thing.

And everyone had a kitchen or a fold-out bed

and a chair beside an open window,

and no one knew the hour, and no one knew the day,

but behind locked doors and curtains, they danced

to the music pumped through the walls

that no one could escape, and to that other music

that rose off the blood, that could not be silenced-

and so on and so forth-

and the seed of hope still had not vanished

from the face of the childless earth.

 ***

Used with permission.

From Nude Descending an Empire (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2014). 

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Sam Taylor is the author of two books of poems, Body of the World (Ausable/Copper Canyon Press) and Nude Descending an Empire (Pitt Poetry Series), and the recipient of the 2014-2015 Amy Lowell Poetry Travelling Scholarship, as well as other honors.  His work most frequently explores themes of mysticism, sexuality, ecology, politics, suffering, and the mystery of the world.  His recently released Nude Descending an Empire develops the lyrical voice of a citizen-poet engaged with politics, history, and the urgency of our contemporary moment.  Taylor is currently an Assistant Professor in the MFA program at Wichita State University.  See more at www.samtaylor.us.

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The Poetry Contest Deadline Fast Approaches

Contest judge this year is the inimitable Natalie Diaz, author of When My Brother Was an Aztec (Copper Canyon Press, 2012). Diaz has been honored with the Nimrod/Hardman Pablo Neruda Prize for Poetry, the Louis Untermeyer Scholarship in Poetry from Bread Loaf, the Narrative Poetry Prize, and a Lannan Literary Fellowship. She was a featured poet at the 2014 Split This Rock Poetry Festival.

First prize $500, second and third prizes $250 each.

Sam Taylor is very kindly offering a copy of Nude Descending an Empire for up to three poets selected for honorable mentions in this, the 8th annual Split This Rock Poetry Contest.

For contest details and to submit your poems of provocation and witness, visit our website here. 

Contest Deadline: November 1st, 2014.

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