April 17: "God-With-Us"
Martha
"God-With-Us"
Reginald Shepherd
after Jean Valentine
What will I call you
when you are gone?
How will I know your name?
Little star, reflection
on the Sea of Galilee,
a lantern in the wood, half-hid,
half-seen?
reflecting on what can’t be
touched, be known?
And the sheen of milk
across the sky, the galaxy poured out
like me, true sky, false dawn,
and a young woman’s nipple,
star of milk, star of a
nursing child’s mouth, my
child, my lord, whoever
you may be today, tonight
which will not end, a cup
passed to me, from which I may
or may not drink, half-empty
star, still asleep by now?
And your small body, Emmanuel,
(how small my heart
to fit inside yours)
lie there, pearled, asleep…
How I want to believe.
(a pearl, an irritant).
----
This was the last poem Reginald Shepherd wrote, from the hospital, about two weeks before his 2008 death. The quotation marks in the title complicate it in the best way, I think. It's not necessarily something he's saying; it's an idea he's talking about. (Or that's my guess, anyway.)
One possible reference: God With Us was written on the belt buckles of German soldiers going into battle in World War I. (As pointed out by his partner Robert Philen in the foreword to the posthumously published Red Clay Weather.)
+ Previously shared: Tantalus in May, Reginald Shepherd
Feast:
2025: I Have a Time Machine, Brenda Shaughnessy
2024: You Belong to the World, Carrie Fountain
2023: Mammogram Call Back with Ultra Sound, Ellen Bass
2022: Catastrophe Is Next to Godliness, Franny Choi
2021: Weather, Claudia Rankine
2020: The Understudy, Bridget Lowe
2019: Against Dying, Kaveh Akbar
2018: Close Out Sale, Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz
2017: Things That Have Changed Since You Died, Laura Kasischke
2016: Percy, Waiting for Ricky, Mary Oliver
2015: My Heart, Kim Addonizio
2014: My Skeleton, Jane Hirshfield
2013: Catch a Body, Oliver Bendorf
2012: No, Mark Doty
2011: from Narrative: Ali, Elizabeth Alexander
2010: Baseball Canto, Lawrence Ferlinghetti
2009: Nothing but winter in my cup, Alice George
2008: Poppies in October, Sylvia Plath
2007: I Imagine The Gods, Jack Gilbert
2006: An Offer Received In This Morning’s Mail, Amy Gerstler
2005: The Last Poem In The World, Hayden Carruth