Jay Leeming • Dynamite on a China Plate
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Order Online: Published: January 2006 |
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Jay Leeming has his own way of thinking which isn’t like anyone else’s. His most individual poems come from that surprising angle of vision that mark him as a real poet. His poems are witty, winged beings that dive straight to the playful, lunatic heart of human companionship.
• Robert Bly - Author of Iron John: A Book About Men
These poems are a delight to read. They move effortlessly between the rational and irrational, the conscious and unconscious, accounting for the multiplicity of human desire and imagination.
• Li-Young Lee - Author of Rose, National Book Award winner
Jay Leeming writes like an angel. Luminous, startling poems that lift and transform...once you experience them, it is quite possible you will begin, immediately, to need them. This is a very good sign.
• Naomi Shihab Nye - Author of You and Yours, Isabella Gardner Poetry Award
About the Author:
Jay Leeming's poems have appeared in a variety of journals including Ploughshares, The Gettysburg Review, Poetry East, and Black Warrior Review. He has been a featured reader at Butler University, the Omega Institute, Robert Bly’s Great Mother Conference and the Woodstock Poetry Festival. He lives and teaches in Ithaca, New York.
From Jay Leeming's Dynamite on a China Plate
Man Writes Poem
This just in a man has begun writing a poem
in a small room in Brooklyn. His curtains
are apparently blowing in the breeze. We go now
to our man Harry on the scene, what’s
the story down there Harry? “Well Chuck
he has begun the second stanza and seems
to be doing fine, he’s using a blue pen, most
poets these days use blue or black ink so blue
is a fine choice. His curtains are indeed blowing
in a breeze of some kind and what’s more his radiator
is ‘whistling’ somewhat. No metaphors have been written yet,
but I’m sure he’s rummaging around down there
in the tin cans of his soul and will turn up something
for us soon. Hang on- just breaking news here Chuck,
there are ‘birds singing’ outside his window, and a car
with a bad muffler has just gone by. Yes…definitely
a confirmation on the singing birds.” Excuse me Harry
but the poem seems to be taking on a very auditory quality
at this point wouldn’t you say? “Yes Chuck, you’re right,
but after years of experience I would hesitate to predict
exactly where this poem is going to go. Why I remember
being on the scene with Frost in ’47, and with Stevens in ’53,
and if there’s one thing about poems these days it’s that
hang on, something’s happening here, he’s just compared the curtains
to his mother, and he’s described the radiator as ‘Roaring deep
with the red walrus of History’. Now that’s a key line,
especially appearing here, somewhat late in the poem,
when all of the similes are about to go home. In fact he seems
a bit knocked out with the effort of writing that line,
and who wouldn’t be? Looks like…yes, he’s put down his pen
and has gone to brush his teeth. Back to you, Chuck.” Well
thanks Harry. Wow, the life of the artist. That’s it for now,
but we’ll keep you informed of more details as they arise.
© 2010 The Backwaters Press. All rights reserved. Updated: April 21, 2010