wife
barefoot in the grass,
arms outstretched,
I imagine my own
neck
split
black
grit
dug into my skin.
the unnatural twist of a wrist.
closing my eyes,
I step back inside,
forgetting
a galaxy exists right over my dumb head
dumb because
all I know is this floor,
this dish, this cup.
dumb because I never look up.
DJ Wolfinsohn
DJ Wolfinsohn’s first published work was a riot grrrl ‘zine. Her fiction and poetry can be found in Gone Lawn, HAD, Variant Lit, Hog River Press, Lost Balloon, and on her website, debbywolfinsohn.com. Her 'zine can be found in the rock 'n roll hall of fame in Cleveland, where it is part of the permanent collection. She lives in Austin, Texas, with her family.
Why this Knocked Taylor Out:
I sat with this poem for a long time trying to decide on it. I knew there was something about it that enamored me so much but I couldn't quite put my finger on it and the whole point of BRAWL is that I have to be able to say why I loved it. And in reading it over and over and over and over (literally) the poem became a part of me a little bit and so here is my potentially very wrong but personal read of this poem:
There is both violence and wonder coursing underneath the language of this poem. The speaker has endured some type of immense violence and is taking a small second, barefoot in the grass, to look up, finally. Not in violence but in wonder. But within that looking up the speaker cannot escape the violence and thinks instead of the harm caused to them, and returns to the domestic sphere, thinking about how they never look up.
It's a haunting and subtle portrayal of domestic violence that holds many interpretations and I am fascinated by it.
But okay “Taylor that could be wrong right?” Yeah for sure. But there are some cool craft choices here too worth noting. The form refuses any type of standardization or conformity. (Which aligns with my reading…sorry!) Not to mention that opening image is really captivating.
I also think this is a poem where the title is doing a lot of work and I really appreciate that. I work for two lit mags and one thing I’ve noticed is a lot of people write of titles as unimportant but I think they can do a lot of labor for the poem and DJ is showing us that even with a simple single word title, a lot of meaning can be added.
Interview:
Why did you choose Team Taylor for this poem?
Submitting poems is such a vulnerable process — I thought a fellow lady might have a deeper understanding of this one. (Also, I love basketball:))
I truly do want to know what work you intend this poem to be doing? It feels like there are two distinct parts, the first two quatrains split from the second two by the line "the unnatural twist of a wrist." What are you trying to express with this poem?
Living in Austin means living within earshot of a highway, always. The hum of tires on blacktop is constant, along with the sound of sirens, and I often stand outside and listen to them, aware that I might be hearing…someone's end-of-life sound. (Poets, am I right!?) Though these "highway poem" elements were edited out of the final version -- the invisible skeleton remains. This faint siren of death in the margins.
Another part of the poem is a question that haunts me/my poetic main characters: WHY aren't we CONSTANTLY screaming about the fact that we are small, vulnerable creatures stuck to a ROCK, flying through space?!?!?! Like how could a dirty dish or a messy poem take priority over the sight of the earth's actual atmosphere right overhead!? The agony of being human — this wife is so stuck and yet --- right above her head another world goes flying by, out of reach.
But I guess that doesn't fully explain things. The shadow of violence -- the ghost of the old drafts of this poem -- probably does. As does the mix of mundane (dishes) with profound (death). To say more would be to spoil it. I want the reader to feel it out for themselves. To interpret their own life through this poem.
The title seems to carry a lot of weight in this poem? How do you go about deciding how to title poems in general, and how did you decide on this one?
I love titles. They are the “book cover,” right? I've used them as jokes, hints, mood-setters and cheater first lines. Here I kept it brutally simple, keeping with the clean tone/look of the work. It was an economical way to convey who the poem was about and to give the reader a bit of pause. To think, what's the meaning of this word? What feeling does this evoke in my heart? In the end, how the reader answers these questions depends on their own experience. And that experience will color their reading of the poem itself.