Sidney Wade has published five collections of poems, the most recent of which is Stroke (Persea Books, 2008).
Her poems and translations have appeared in a wide variety of journals, including Poetry, The New Yorker, Grand Street, and The Paris Review, among others. She translates the poems of Melih Cevdet Anday, Yahya Kemal, and several others, from the Turkish. She taught at Istanbul University as a Senior Fulbright Fellow in 1989-90. She is the poetry editor of the literary journal Subtropics and was recently elected Secretary/Treasurer of the American Literary Translators’ Association, ALTA. Her web site is at www.sidneywade.com.
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Interlude
the never-ending
meditation
continues in
this early
morning
squirrels on
the porch
and in the trees
the lake is still
the silence
blue I’ve belled
the cat made
coffee and
am ready
with my pencil
to accept
whatever
mind imagines
is its music
or its body
or its gold
I’ve hung
the niger
thistle-seed
and am
waiting
for the cloud
of goldfinches
I hear is near
to appear.
Such Luck
in the larger
darknesses
of the ground
west of sight
I’m shouting
at the mountain
of silence
and depth
when
an eye opens
and I open
my mouth
to devour
the sound
of night
which in time
will filter
through all
that swings
or hums
my fist
is full
of letters
my wrist
aches like
a drum
such luck
to hold
this compendium
of resonant
voices in
the sanatorium
of my head
whose guest-
book is
crowded
with the high-
brow and
the low-brow
and whose
overseer
in the back-
ground prays
every day
for my bright
daughters
and the black
blue waters
they’re swimming
through and all
the possibilities
they might
swallow
and I know
my strength
and sphere
may be slight
but look
at this
handful
of light
I found
in a crack
in the ground
here
it’s for you