POET-IN-RESIDENCE, 1.5: Eleni Sikelianos

From the Flatmancrooked Winter 09/10 Poet-In-Residence, Eleni Sikelianos, comes selected poems, chosen by the poet from her body of work. These posts will appear every Sunday for the next ten weeks, after which a new Poet-In-Residence will be introduced and his or her work featured. This number 2 of 10. The poems featured in previous weeks can be found here: Week 1, Week 2, Week 3, Week 4

Matter has been Blown

off the Surface

of this V____i____s____i____b____le Star

In my collection of gluons whose color adds up

to white:

a time the universe

was the size of a darkening

string; a quark,

an antiquark, red + antired, green + antigreen, or blue =

white. A glue ball, really— (Are there any

infinities left?) Yes, yes, they still unload the crates

of Coca-Cola in the winter

morning sunlight, some third graders’ milk cartons in blue

plastic bags waiting on the street

corner. What are they waiting for? (The trash

collectors.) I will have to eliminate them — the yellow

styrofoam lunch boxes stacked together, oily, glistening — Listen:

The earth together

with all its inhabitants, all demolished and not-demolished things, is

out there

hissing.

From Blue Guide, one of the two books in Earliest Worlds, Coffee House Press, 2001