Collection

Readings: ‘To 2040’ and Other Poems

Listen to Jorie Graham read a selection of her work published in the LRB.

Poem: ‘To 2040’

Jorie Graham, 18 March 2021

With whom am I speaking, are you one or many, what are u, are u, do I make my-self clear, is this which we called speech what u use, are u a living form such as theform I inhabit now letting it...

Poem: ‘Siri U’

Jorie Graham, 13 August 2020

see me what did u see did u scrape what I asked u for asked u to make me into asked &asked there is a name in the body of this blood-rush which u parse in-correctly, I know u think u connect...

Poem: ‘Thaw’

Jorie Graham, 7 May 2020

There is a plot in the back of my building.Not the size of the asteroid.Not what fourhyper-crenellations of a reef would have held when there werereefs. It’s still here. I must notget the...

Poem: ‘Whom Are You’

Jorie Graham, 10 October 2019

speaking to. What is that listening tous. I’d like to know whom to address. In this we callthe physical world. Is there another where the footfalls gofrom this stony path as it grows...

stillness. Stillness in time. Rich concentrate. Late summer late-day light. Over but not on magenta. Of. Of dahlia-heads. Of serrated leaves trimmed gold. Plush stalk lost-still in non-moment....

Poem: ‘When Overfull of Pain I’

Jorie Graham, 25 October 2018

lie down on this floor, unnotice, try to recall, stir a little but not in heart, feel rust coming, grass going, if I had an idea this time, if I could believe in the cultivation, just piece it...

Poem: ‘All’

Jorie Graham, 30 August 2018

After the rain stops you can hear the rained-on. You hear oscillation, outflowing, slips. The tipping-down of the branches, the down, the exact weight of those drops that fell

over the days and...

Poem: ‘My Skin Is’

Jorie Graham, 5 July 2018

parched, on tight, questioned, invisible, full of so much evolution, now the moment is gone, begin again, my skin, here, my limit of the visible me, I touch it now, is spirit-filled,...

Poem: ‘Tree’

Jorie Graham, 8 February 2018

Today on two legs stood and reached to the right spot as I saw it choosing among the twisting branches and multifaceted changing shades, and greens, and shades of greens, lobed, and lashing sun,...

Poem: ‘From the Transience’

Jorie Graham, 2 November 2017

May I help you. No. In the mirror? No. Look there is still majesty, increase, sacrifice. Night in the flat pond. Moon in it/on it disposing entirely of mind. No. Look there is desert where there...

Poem: ‘I’m Reading Your Mind’

Jorie Graham, 13 July 2017

here. Have been for centuries. No, longer. Everything already has been. It’s not a reasonable place, this continuum between us, and yet here again I put the olive trees in, turn the whole...

Teasing out the possible linkages I – no you – who noticed – if the world – no – the world if – take plankton – I feel I cannot love any more –...

Poem: ‘Deep Water Trawling’

Jorie Graham, 9 October 2014

The blades like irises turning very fast to see you completely – steel-blue then red where the cut occurs – the cut of you – they don’t want to know you they want to own...

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