Saturday, February 6, 2021

GAS Featured Poet: Mark Saba


 Mark Saba has been writing fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction for 40 years. His book publications include, most recently, Two Novellas: A Luke of All Ages / Fire and IceCalling the Names (poetry), and Ghost Tracks(stories about Pittsburgh, where he grew up). His work has appeared widely in literary magazines around the U.S. and abroad. Also a painter, Mark works as a medical illustrator at Yale University. Please see marksabawriter.com.


The Sweet Breath of Indifference



Rattles the window panes
on its way to my bed.


I remember its gentle force
dressed in darkness, the way it tapped

my shoulder mid-adolescence,
time travel on its back.

It came up the hill, spring scents
and winter blasts, a blanket that wrapped us

stormy summer evenings sitting
on our grandparents' porch.

Judgments came and went with the news,
professed in classrooms, barked out of relatives'

mouths. I let them dissipate
as that sweet breath of indifference

kept me on my way,
sculpting with gentle caresses

the signature of my self.






Inscription



Pulling a book off my shelf

because I'm not sure I remember it

I open the cover and find a long inscription


written by a friend. I'd forgotten

this birthday gift from youth,

the sweetness of the message


as it lifted from the page.

It spoke of loneliness, and offered

a balm of Kahlil Gibran.


Two passages, above and below her note,

call for healing. I search the pages

for my customary marks, things


to be remembered, even cherished.

But the book is empty.

Now I'm sure I never read it.


Blinders fall from my eyes;
my heart shifts into reverse.
I'm sorry, I say


to an empty room.


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