Issue 2.2
Summer 2022
Jami Macarty
Reflection
This poem, from The Long Now Conditions Permit, tracks an unfolding walk to Crab Park in the Downtown Eastside (DTES) neighborhood in Vancouver, British Columbia on the traditional territories of the Squamish, Tsleil-Waututh, and Musqueam First Nations. The DTES has been profoundly burdened by male violence against, and the unrelenting deaths and disappearances of, women and girls of all races. The title echoes Esther Lee's prose poem “Before (a poem about suspension)” from Sacrificial Metal (Conduit Books & Ephemeral, 2020), which I read after the steps of the poem assembled themselves into a list. During that time, bridges arced my thinking—physical, conceptual, and temporal bridges between events—before after and the irrevocable.
Before, a Study of Suspension
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before a golden dog frightens to flight glaucous-winged gulls
before gulls wing-lift from water to air
circle back to before a woman and man toss bread
walking through which my eyes lift before
great blue heron drafts the bridge
before two-by porta-potty doors wide open contrary or joining
the greening unfolding openings of maple oak and grass
geese waddle nibble
before a woman kneels
rolls her bedroll
before
the murdered and missing women's memorial bench
a man stops and smells the roses
before the one white rose at his nose’s height
before a boat motoring north ferries workers
geared in hard hats and safety orange to where who knows
the rounded corner breeze
before invasive Queen Anne's lace
before a crow on a maple branch turns its emollient back to the water
three elders warm for Tai Chi
before a woman at the shore looks up to a woman on the path
before knowing is that knowingly
before knowing who is there to know
birthday crepe winds pink the pier railing
a silver 9 balloon downed and deflated in the railing’s corner—
who is yesterday's nine-year-old?
A writer of essays, reviews, and poetry, Jami Macarty is the author of The Minuses (Center for Literary Publishing, 2020), winner of the 2020 New Mexico/Arizona Book Award - Poetry Arizona. Jami's second collection, The Long Now Conditions Permit, was a finalist for the 2022 Test Site Poetry Series Prize.
Jami's Book Recommendations
The Little Book of No Consolation (Barrow Street Press, 2021), by Becka Mara McKay
Ark (Flood Editions, 2014), by Ronald Johnson
Reverse Rapture (Wave Books, 2005), by Dara Wier
CURB (Nightboat Books, 2021), by Divya Victor
Morgan (a Lyric) (Gold Line Press, 2022), by Boyer Rickel