Kim Addonizio is the author of four poetry collections including Tell Me, a National Book Award finalist. Her fifth collection, Lucifer at the Starlite, will be published by W.W. Norton in October 2009. Addonizio's awards include two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Pushcart Prize, a Commonwealth Club Poetry Medal, and the John Ciardi Lifetime Achievement Award. Her poetry, fiction, and essays have appeared widely in anthologies, literary journals, and textbooks. She teaches private workshops in Oakland, CA, and online. Read more about this exceptional writer in the “Folios” section.
For You | Lucifer at the Starlite
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For You
For you I undress down to the sheaths of my nerves.
I remove my jewelry and set it on the nightstand,
I unhook my ribs, spread my lungs flat on a chair.
I dissolve like a remedy in water, in wine.
I spill without staining, and leave without stirring the air.
I do it for love. For love, I disappear.
Lucifer at the Starlite
--after George Meredith
Here’s my bright idea for life on earth:
better management. The CEO
has lost touch with the details. I’m worth
as much, but I care; I come down here, I show
my face, I’m a real regular. A toast:
To our boys and girls in the war, grinding
through sand, to everybody here, our host
who’s mostly mist, like methane rising
from retreating ice shelves. Put me in command.
For every town, we’ll have a marching band.
For each thoroughbred, a comfortable stable;
for each worker, a place beneath the table.
For every forward step a stumbling.
A shadow over every starlit thing.
(These poems are from the collection “Lucifer at the Starlite” to be published by W.W. Norton in October 2009.)
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(The Cartier Dragon pen is resplendent with clouds which glide over body and cap of midnight blue lacquer. A palladium-finished exquisitely detailed sterling silver dragon with pure emerald eyes climbs the cap. A Mother-of-Pearl cabochon is set into the barrel's end. Courtesy of “Joon Pens.”)
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