Reading Tsvetaeva on Father’s Day
This week in the PEN Poetry Series, PEN America features a poem by Chase Berggrun.
Reading Tsvetaeva on Father’s Day
was smallness what I wanted
was what I wanted small
the sound of the train’s brake, suddenly
memories of my father
the last safe days of my life
what I knew, what I bound with string
a word of hers, repeated
a kiss on the forehead — erases
I lived until I tried not to, then began again
orbiting an offer, never landing on solid overture
if what I wanted was to calmly rot, I failed
I followed a weapon to its wound
I rose from salt to become a canker
I ate until eating became injury
the dream was Marina & thin, wise — as any creature
my trudge home, urging toward polluted waters
my gait, queer & constantly at risk
a body badly labeled
someone else’s fistful of descriptive clouds
between “boy” & an ontological problem
between “boy” & consistent betrayal
between “boy” & skirt, dress, jacket, jean
the dream was Marina sleeping, slumped over her desk
I was the size of an ocean & I watched nearby
everything was decided for us
I wanted a story I could fit into
a lover, like lemon & sugar, I could sit beside
the skirt of the sun, my sadness swept gently
the light that tastes aluminum in the morning when I am not prepared for it
a fresh, unwed sound
the dream was Marina & then a sharp crack of a match
& something more than I was, something strong, slid out of my chapped lips
story of travel & terror & change
in Northampton Massachusetts I was a mouthful of pills
a cluster of firebird feathers in my predator’s fist
I told two tiny secrets
I swam the whole Connecticut
I jumped from the old bridge
couldn’t shake the feeling when fear touched my shoulder
couldn’t take myself away from the world, the way he did
the dream was Marina, music, my father
at night I swam the channels between the fifty-four bones of his two hands
his hands on brass & wood & ivory
voice silk with affection
all day, these reminders
they made a whole holiday for this
bedside question, white coat, cold roar
what I recall is carefully curated
his face a changeless anguish
the dream was Marina & she was there with me, time-untouched
a mountain & at its foot I was tender
when I began to climb my excess softened
a mountain is first & foremost what I stand on
my exact worth
let me value myself: one mere coin
let me shake the abacus: so that none may know the number
I relive my younger pains
here in Brooklyn the sky & its comforting rumble
I make comparisons to compensate & cover up
Marina’s daughter’s death, of starvation
I compare in times of fever to my father’s
aspiration of the regurgitated contents of the stomach
leading to asphyxia & coma
extremes functionally identical
look — it’s evening; look — it’s nearly night
I dipped my fists into the sand
waiting for the next wave, collecting stones
left a candle unattended on the altar
there used to be a house, at the end of the street, red & flamingo
I knew a monster when I saw one
the aesthetics that concerned me were abjection & collapse
the body I was told I had but didn’t have
the fumble felt like leaning against a kind of freedom
something I was searching for: I found it, despite myself, crawling in & out of the future
the power to pay attention
the dream was Marina & a prayer of concentration, nude
laid out bare with only two wings to cover me
re-sculpting the undesirable contours of my own torso
obscure center sheltered by a white sheet
the silhouette dancing to an uneven rhythm
this is where I lost myself for good
a nightswim among the living lights, the bay
a laboratory for radical re-appellation
& a selfish song of second chances
between “boy” & being brave
between “boy” & a lump in the throat
between “boy” & the brittle ovals of my eyes
my rebrand made real by extra lashes, booming color
my body my brand new toy
something to keep from falling
the dream was Marina & fishnets, the coastline dripping with scales
the fist of Cape Cod unclenched into the sea
& the memory of me is soon a drifting island
impermanent; I was asleep
I was waiting for war
communicating all this is more akin to midrash than translation
there was a great magnet at the bottom of the well
there was a surge of metal & grime
I pulled up a pailful
I drank, drank
I stood in front of the mirror for hours
my shoulders lifting & sagging like scales, I strained to keep them level
one errant bone lingered outward looking to escape
burns scattered like heavy raindrops down one side
I shifted proportions month to month but every insult stayed weighted on my waist
I wanted to belong to the whole sky, in which, perhaps, there is no place for me
to that which I have invented
I crawled gingerly into the evening & grew
there, the place between the candles & the expired condoms
everything glittered in the living room like a deep distasteful dream
summer back home, I was green with kale & desire, crowing
there, I was a feral problem
conception happened because of an argument between two stars
those lips, toes bent back as if they wished to be broken
I wanted to be taken but I also wanted to feel healthy
the dream was Marina & a hologram of pain
a black fly danced out of my mouth
sour heat gathered marbles of sweat into a little ocean
the dutiful Jew soaked with remembrance
yizkor prayer pelting down like hail
packed with corpse
Friday shuddered into sky, the opposite of balance
a storm lingered outside my bathroom window like a hungry dog
early darkness tattooed the sea on the scrub pine’s bicep
the leaf of my love had shrunk, folded inward & drooping
the dream was Marina &
I was still, unsober
in the city, steel rising like gravestone, God swallowed me as green poison
on the spots where someone’s fists learned to love me I drew lips in black ink
I choked on the waning month
a sad moon wandered at the horizon
I had been canceled
a log so damp with rot, neglecting burn
I came from heaven carrying a bird’s wing
saying no to all possible futures
when November began to bleed blue
I avoided operating alone the machinery of nostalgia
unsafe with drink
but garbled memory snuck back in
the dream was Marina
say this is only dream
for years I sought out an I that slept in the thickness of a man who was not there
who was & was not
the body to which I was born seemed an enemy
& when I finally awoke
between “boy” & the first breath of the morning, the first cigarette
between “boy” & a political nightmare
between “boy” & self-portrait as blaze of glory
at the smell of daylight
I started to glow from the inside out with surprise
I was cozy with despair
despair: faint, grotesque in its lightness
I bent before the dawn, crawling in across the sand
the sun’s black stove heated morning
every subsequent hour a scream increasing in volume & decreasing in potency
all this chaos colored me ripe, fresher than the warm air
the dream was
the ocean, unintelligible
dividing the shape of the plural
what could I use to glue together these thousands of discrete sections
I was parted to the side
a silver bell in my mouth
essentially a radio wave, that kind of body
who shall say I am not the happy genius
measuring the wrecked length of my life
it was too late, spring approached me, Easter, then a bullet
Marina, who did not like the sea
a vast expanse & nothing to walk on
but to me it was delight
I was content with simply sinking
there was no word for me that was not saturated
I was lifting my own body from the water
I could not say it succinctly
I could not say how much this me weighs
but I knew how it felt when I was a body among other bodies
crushed under their wind
those stable bodies secure in their trappings
the idea of comfort was foreign
my vocabulary refused a vocal wisdom
but I discovered how to direct the ink, the smudge
how to emphasize percussion
I scanned the silent space between sleeplessnesses
where the meter sleeps small & fuzzy
a performance of that particular memory
my father on his way out
time echoed off his chest, square & center-stiff
I beheld what settled
his quiet was a mirror reflecting what I had yet to learn about myself
I was his Icarus, embalmed before launch
I pried his eyelid open
nothing was safe or sanitary despite sterility
his body drifted away on a pile of leaves & reeds
though the sound of his sleeping lingered
the hum the ebb the wane
until somewhere inside of me a cord snapped
& in a panic I crawled back into
the dream
where I was pierced by a forked tongue
I split into segments & sewed them back together into something more intentional
in me there is no arbitrariness
though there is a bit of ambiguity
an oversized image of outrage
a stone waiting its turn to be cut
near the end
hunger burned in the usual way
at my desk, I know your grain by heart, I worked on sweet nothing
tending to language, my fickle, failing crop
I was walking in an effort to keep on walking
writing onto the tongue of a man found in bed brain-dead, two days later
writing reckless, traceless & speechless, going down like a sinking ship
it took so long to get here & when I finally arrived
this is how you & I part, bruised & bigger than we began
pushing tired bulks until we reach a bench, a bridge, a place to wait
though I was afraid of the revolving door, I spun through to the other side
I was as solid as I could bear to be
asking myself gently to rework that smallness
a version of self
closing into itself, churning, rushing toward
the
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