ÿþ<html> <head> <meta http-equiv=content-type content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> <title>slope 16</title> <style type="text/css"> p,td { font-family: "georgia", "arial", "helvetica"; text-decoration:none; font-size:11px; color:#000000; margin-top:9px; margin-bottom:9px;} p.poem { font-family: "georgia", "arial", "helvetica"; text-decoration:none; font-size:11px; color:#000000; margin-top:40px; margin-bottom:60px;} a { font-family: "georgia", "arial", "helvetica"; text-decoration:none; font-size:11px; color:#77280a; } a:hover { font-family: "georgia", "arial", "helvetica"; text-decoration:underline; font-size:11px; color:#77280a; } </style> </head> <body bgcolor="#ffffff" background="images/bg.gif" topmargin="0" leftmargin="0" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0"> <table border="0" width="750" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="center"> <tr> <td> <object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=4,0,0,0" width="750" height="127" id="topmenu" align=""> <param name=movie value="topmenu.swf"> <param name=quality value=high> <param name=bgcolor value=#ffffff> <embed src="topmenu.swf" quality=high bgcolor=#ffffff width="750" height="127" name="topmenu" align="" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer"></embed> </object> </td> </tr> <tr> <td> <img src="images/page_top.gif" /><br /> </td> </tr> <tr> <td background="images/page_bg.gif" style="padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 50px; padding-right: 50px;"> <img src="images/title_new.gif" /> <p><b>Carrie Etter</b> moved from southern California to London in August 2001. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in <i>Meridian, Poetry Review, Seneca Review, Thumbscrew</i> and elsewhere, and in 1998 Potes & Potes published her chapbook, <u>Subterfuge for the Unrequitable</u>.</p> <p class="poem"> <b>The Missing Roses</b><br /> <br /> Stark, the leafless, spindly trees against the horizon <i>someone came along,<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;clipped the new blooms</i> yet glamorous, while one robin,<br /> most legible bird, recasts the periphery around him.<br /> <br /> <i>Who thinks they can hoard?</i> Is she only angry if she manifests it, bites<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;her carrot with an unseemly malevolence or rends that night s blouse<br /> into two, four, eight? I ll say it again: glamorous over the indistinguishable<br /> <br /> weeds only a few shades darker than milk. The January sun ascends only<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;so high, and that far she won t follow it. If I put winter and<br /> glamorous on the same line, the rebuke will be  maybe in California, <br /> <br /> <i>roses a red becoming purple next to my door</i> and I ll shrug toward<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;the sun s last glance, the sky a pink too dim to call pastel,<br /> too light, too welcome for tenebrous <i>as though with the right apparatus</i> <br /> <br /> <i>butterfly net, haversack</i> . Downwind on the plaza, she perches on a folding chair<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;for the next measure of Prokofiev <i>imagine it: hedge clippers cut<br /> the music from the air, the music drops into a common handbag, and zip!</i><br /> <br /> with one eyebrow raised.<br /> </p> <p class="poem"> <b>Gingersome</b><br /> <br /> blithe to trespass gingerly gingerly<br /> adroit at the cusp&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;liquor s reelsome push<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;into the shining mire<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;(that desire)<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;generality as possibility, unmarked, unspoken<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;immanent yet hovering as an ache<br /> cold amaretto around and around the tongue<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;tonguing the unspoken<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;ineffable = impatience (knee to knee)<br /> (better: knee to thigh)<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;fasten seat belt while standing<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;for the yielding, agonized and thrilled<br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;for Icarus<br /> <br /> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;over my tongue.<br /> </p> <p class="poem"> <b>Divining for Starters (7),</b><br /> <br /> From regret as a matter of shame of the instance and pride in the general feeling. There we stake our corrigibility, a viable hope.<br /> <br /> The instance proves problematic. Garish details at once vivify regret and narrow it to the peril of generalization.<br /> <br /> The general feeling brings its malaise, a self-pity. But we do not aspire to the confessional, as the insistence on plurality has already indicated.<br /> <br /> We could regret that the we is not of itself egalitarian. <i>We</i> must have margins to elide. But what begins in its own incapability without espousing another beginning that at least hints what ability will now be wielded?<br /> <br /> We begin in regret to prepare for the remedy. Still I would find the fallow field and not ask from what crop it was spared.<br /> <br /> To begin I erase. So histories are written. So regret mounts, and we pretend to begin.<br /> </p> </td> </tr> <tr> <td> <img src="images/page_bottom.gif" /><br /> </td> </tr> </table> </body> </html>