Kaveh Akbar reads PORTRAIT OF THE ALCOHOLIC FLOATING IN SPACE WITH SEVERED UMBILICUS

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I caught Kaveh Akbar reading in Bryant Park last summer at an event for Sibling Rivalry Press and was enjoying the reading so much I took out my iPhone and recorded the last poem. I’d recorded him before at the Poetry Project, but not this poem. Enjoy.
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PORTRAIT OF THE ALCOHOLIC FLOATING IN SPACE WITH SEVERED UMBILICUS

In Fort Wayne I drank the seniors … Old Milwaukee
Old Crow … in Indianapolis I stopped … now I regret
every drink I never took … all around … coffee grounds
and eggshells … this sweating … a mouthful
of lime … as a boy I stole a mint green bra
from a laundromat … I took it home to try on
while my parents slept … filled its cups with the smallest
turnips in our pantry … the underwire grew
into me like a strangler fig … my blood roiled then
as now … back on earth frogspit is dripping
down wild aloe spikes … salmon are bullying
their way upstream … there is a pond I leapt into once
with a lonely blonde boy … when we scampered out one of us
was in love … I could not be held responsible
for desire … he could not be held at all … I wonder
where he is now … if he looked up he might see
me … a sparkling … I always hoped that when I died
I would know why … my brother will be so sad … he will tell
his daughter I was better than I was … he will leave out
my crueldrunk nights the wet mattresses … my driving alone
into cornfields unsure whther I’d drive out … I wish
he were here now … he could be here … this cave
is big enough for everyone … look at all the diamonds

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Portrait of the Alcoholic is published by Sibling Rivalry Press. Check them out:

http://siblingrivalrypress.com/

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PORTRAIT OF THE ALCOHOLIC FLOATING IN SPACE WITH SEVERED UMBILICUS was previously published in Poetry