Don't look now, but a poet is making a stir in the world of celebrity woo-pitching.
Perhaps you've heard of Padma Lakshmi, since she has written cookbooks, hosted TV shows, been married to Salman Rushdie -- and, at the age of fifty, somehow continues to look like this.
Padme Lakshmi
Lakshmi recently caught the attention of those gossip gurus at Page Six by stepping out with a handsome new "mystery man." Eagle-eyed poetry fans probably knew (even before People reported it) that the mystery man was a much-respected versifier named Terrance Hayes.
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Who looks like this.
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Being a finalist for the National Book Award never got Hayes this kind of attention. Lest we begin to consider him as merely a pretty face, let's remember what this blog is about and enjoy one of his poems.
American Sonnets for Wanda C.
Who I know knows why all those lush-boned worn-out girls are
Whooping at where the moon should be, an eyelid clamped
On its lightness. Nobody sees her without the hoops firing in her
Ears because nobody sees. Tattooed across her chest she claims
Is BRING ME TO WHERE MY BLOOD RUNS and I want that to be here
Where I am her son, pent in blackness and turning the night's calm
Loose and letting the same blood fire through me. In her bomb hair:
Shells full of thunder; in her mouth: the fingers of some calamity,
Somebody foolish enough to love her foolishly. Those who could hear
No music weren't listening—and when I say it, it's like claiming
She's an elegy. It rhymes, because of her, with effigy. Because of her,
If there is no smoke, there is no party. I think of you, Miss Calamity,
Every Sunday. I think of you on Monday. I think of you hurling hurt
Where the moon should be and stomping into our darkness calmly.
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