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william doreski
William Doreski lives in Peterborough, New Hampshire. His most recent collection of poetry is Waiting for the Angel (2009). He has published three critical studies, including Robert Lowell’s Shifting Colors. His essays, poetry, fiction, and reviews have appeared in many journals, including Massachusetts Review, Notre Dame Review, The Alembic, New England Quarterly, Harvard Review, Modern Philology, Antioch Review, Natural Bridge. He also won the 2010 Aesthetic poetry prize. William was kind enough to discuss with us his inspiration for the powerful poem below, "The Mess the Assassination Left." You can read about this here. If you're interested in learning more about him, check out his blog. |
the mess the assassination left
Developers leveled the forest behind your cottage. Six hundred acres of habitat gnawed away. One unfinished house staggers against the prevailing wind. The naked reddish soil suggests a surgical field, a potential site of infection. Bankrupt, the developers left the country and thrive in Guatemala where no one cares that their Spanish sounds like ground glass and their kids bully kids who badly outplay them at soccer. You regard the barren landscape with a sigh. Your husband left a sheaf of papers proving that J. Edgar Hoover conspired to murder Trotsky in Mexico, but Mercader beat him to it. The cottage roof leaks. Pale stains on the parlor ceiling mimic the mess the assassination left in Mexico City. You don’t care whether historians understand how devious Hoover could be, your late husband also a stooge of the FBI. Orchids flourish in rococo pots. Overheated with propane, your tiny house braces itself against the blank and windy space behind it— dust ghosting in ruddy billows in memory of a killing no one would hesitate to replicate, the unfinished house collapsing in a slew of weathered sticks. If you like "The Mess the Assassination Left," check out Andrew McFadyen-Ketchum's "Deer Ticks" |
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