Guidebooks for the Dead
Published in Poem Of The Day
Mother's crimson leather bags
Crammed with saint cards
And tiny glass bottles of liquor.
The bright stitch
Of God's final coming.
Dirt and dregs, silt and stars.
The sweet song
Of poverty
Rinsing through me
Like the memory
Of a dream.
About this poem
"I am currently at work on a new collection of poems 'on' or 'around' ruins-which, in my mind, is a photograph of the end; of junk and rubble, of us with our things. In this 'snapshot' is my mother, while she was still in Germany, still a dancer, before she became a woman in exile."
-Cynthia Cruz
About Cynthia Cruz
Cynthia Cruz is the author of "Wunderkammer" (Four Way Books, 2014). She teaches at Sarah Lawrence College and lives in Brooklyn, N.Y.
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The Academy of American Poets is a nonprofit, mission-driven organization, whose aim is to make poetry available to a wider audience. Email The Academy at poem-a-day[at]poets.org.
(c) 2015 Cynthia Cruz. Originally published by the Academy of American Poets, www.poets.org. Distributed by King Features Syndicate
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