Thou still unravish’d bride of quietness
Thou foster-child of silence and slow time,
Sylvan historian, who canst thus express
A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme
— John Keats “Ode on a Grecian Urn”
I could build a container to carry this being the way I move
in my mind, unencumbered by beauty’s cage.
Stopping at a bronze shard
she examines it/ the sea, the red cliff, my love
getting lost in a firebrick landscape of his
and said, fully of an awe full of sadness,
She touched this, her skin was inside of this.
she was forever fascinated by putting the pieces
together I was a mask, made a mess
Thou still unravish’d bride of quietness
you thought this made you special. your silence was exquisite;
a vessel of mortal emptiness broken into a hundred thousand little pieces
You will know each fissure as it breaks open your life
breaking through, breaking blue and we open our mouths to
finally celebrate it. A celebration should leave a mess —
truth is the dead who leave everything behind
Some paintings make me cry./I Like Crying
I will keep broken things:/ the big clay pot
And soft captivity involves the mind.
Thou foster-child of silence and slow time,
Silence kneads your fear
to know how utterly I have slipped its gilded
hands go back where it came from. clean the room.
Around her, what must be evidence of
this was all sentimental crap, you
sweeping the broken … / glass from beneath my feet with such/ Tenderness
she was forever fascinated by putting the pieces
together as in. I had no idea I would be here now
Live coiled in shells of loneliness,
Sylvan historian, who canst thus express.
I am a continuance of blue sky
This body is a song-/ bird in a kiln.
my body is not just my body, but that I’m made of old stars and
a broken pot bright as the blood/ red edge of the moon
Read your grief like the daily newspaper: “Fragment of a Vessel,” it read
You are Resplendent. You are Radiant. You are Sublime.
Then on your skin a breath caresses
The salt your eyes have shed
when the time came to stand and climb
A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme
This cento is comprised of lines originally composed by the following poets: Claudia Rankine, Ada Limón, Adrienne Chung, Staceyann Chin, Natalie Diaz, Nadia Alexis, Ama Codjoe, Nikki Giovanni, Donika Kelly, Kai Cheng Thom, Samantha Gadbois, Lisbeth White, Destiny Hemphill, Mai Der Vang, Maw Shein Win, Alice Walker, Phillis Wheatley, Toni Morrison, Patrica Smith, Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Natasha Tretheway, Dr Jayé Wood, Ariana Brown, Maya Angelou, Joy Harjo, Athena Nassar, Audre Lorde, Lucille Clifton, Deborah A. Miranda, and Kimiko Hahn. Arranged by Rhena Tan and inspired by the artwork of Pleasure Faith.
Rhena Writes 