Beth Copeland: Second Wife
Fifteen years ago I drove south to see you as trees broke
into bloom—redbuds, pears, dogwoods—and my heart
unfolded like a bud closed too long in the cold.
Beth Copeland: Pyre
Enough wood for a bonfire, I say, recalling the night
we torched a dead Christmas tree, drinking white wine and dancing
around the leaping blaze and the dark morning I burned your love
letters in a metal trash can outside, drunk and weeping, liar! liar!
Beth Copeland: Good Intentions
It’s not the bee’s fault, Daddy says, pulling the stinger from the tender flesh of my inner arm. Look, it’s dead. It didn’t mean any harm. The honeybee, no bigger than a … Continue reading
Beth Copeland: Release
Imagine a goldfinch in your fist. Open it as olive wings soar over dark steeples. If you’re grieving for what never was or will be, bring your … Continue reading
Beth Copeland: Dear Omniscient Narrator
Please don’t let me linger in the ellipses of dementia and disease murmuring goodbye again and again to family and friends. Write a simple sentence with a … Continue reading
Beth Copeland: Bone Moon
Swallow a tablet that tastes
like chalk. Chase it
with an aspirin.
Video — Falling Lessons: Erasure One, a poem by Beth Copeland
. Director Anh Vu, working with the organization Motionpoems, created this video of Beth Copeland’s poem which interweaves images of the natural world with books, papers and other evidence of … Continue reading
