When I read Poetry magazine, I fold over the page-corners of any poems that strike me, and then I go back and read them again, to see if I was just hoping to like something. (That was how I used to read Gourmet, too.) In the October issue, the inside back cover was devoted to an excerpt from a poem by someone named Craig Arnold; it was very moving, but then I've been highly movable this week. (Last night, I went to a party at the new Crosby Street Hotel, and I announced that the suite we were looking at seemed like a nice place for a good cry. It went over like a fart.) Then, as I read through the issue, I tabbed another poem by Craig Arnold, but I didn't really focus on it—poets' names register the way most public relations representatives' names do. And then I got to the "Comment" section, which makes me sigh because I want poetry from Poetry, not prose. Lo and behold, the lead article, "To Let You Pass," was a tribute to Craig Arnold by the magazine's editor, Christian Witkin. I learned that Arnold had died recently, or not died so much as vanished while exploring a volcano on a remote Japanese island; he is presumed dead. It was a very poignant essay, the kind I wish someone would write about me after I die, even if I'm not the type of person who lifts people off the ground when he hugs them, wears leather pants, or explores volcanoes on remote Japanese islands. I have a lot of extraordinary Craig Arnold poetry to post, but here's the one that made me cry while going nowhere on a reclining stationary bike at the gym.
Asunder (excerpt)
by Craig Arnold
On the fire escape of your rented room
we sat and felt the empty city
sweat and fret we passed a cigarette
back and forth as once we passed
words like these between us without
hope of keeping
Now I write
without hope of answer to say
that what we gave each other nakedly
was too much and not enough
To say that since we last touched
I am not empty I hear you named
and my heart starts the pieces of your voice
you left are interleaved with mine
and to this quick spark in the emptiness
to say Yes I miss how love
may make us otherwise
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