A Poem For Saturday

Dish poetry editor Alice Quinn writes:

Bernadette Mayer has won the Poetry Society of America’s 2014 Shelley Memorial Award, established by the will of the late Mary P. Sears in 1929 and awarded by nomination only to a living American poet selected with reference to his or her genius and need. The lineage of this award is mighty, beginning with Conrad Aiken in 1930 and running the gamut of great American figures, from e.e.cummings in 1945 and May Swenson in 1968 to Etheridge Knight in 1985 and Martin Espada and Lucia Perullo in 2013.

“Incidents Report Sonnet # 5 ( for Grace also)” by Bernadette Mayer:

Now you must remember that bed
we slept in head to feet in upstate new york.

David who was probably four
had just so badly injured his foot.

We had scared the wits out of the kids
playing hide & seek outdoors in the dark.

We ate Canadian Oat Bread and baked
millions of potatoes for our charges.

You and I took notes on everything
including Colin’s dream ravings.

I’m forgetting to mention many things
including attempting to swim in the shallow stream.

Then we got into our tiny bed together
with our shared immortal fear of love.