New and Selected Poems

Marjory Wentworth

• Publisher: University of South Carolina Press
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9781611173222
• eBook ISBN: 9781611173239
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: American Poetry
• Index: Literature

An inspiring assortment of new and "best of" works by South Carolina's poet laureate

New and Selected Poems includes more than fifty poems from Marjory Wentworth's previous three collections, Noticing Eden, Despite Gravity, and The Endless Repetition of an Ordinary Miracle, plus twenty-eight new poems. This collection serves as a capstone to Wentworth's tenure as South Carolina poet laureate, a title she has held since 2003.

Thematically Wentworth's poems invite us to view nature as a site of reflection and healing, to consider the power of familial bonds and friendships, and to broaden our awareness of human rights and social justice. Regional settings appear throughout, indicative of Wentworth's commitment to represent her adopted home state of South Carolina in her work. She skillfully employs a variety of forms, from prose poems to sonnets to elegies to list poems, making for a rich and interesting trek through this "best of" collection of her poems to date.

This collection includes a foreword by the poet Carol Ann Davis, author of Psalm and Atlas Hour and assistant professor of English at Fairfield University.

New Poems

Family Reunion

I want to pray, but the doors

to the gray stone church are locked.

Early morning and fog still

clinging to hilltops as if

something is hidden. But there

is a trail behind the church

calling me into the woods,

far from the sea, far from home.

It is cool and dark beneath

the dense trees, and the wind filled

with pine is slight but steady

against my skin. I make my way

along the path, past piles of stones

that might mean something to someone,

and occasional birches

standing alone. I am moving

into the future, but stumbling

through my past as I zigzag

up and down the maze of trails

carved into the place I come from.

Few birds and one startled doe

pass before me. I smile

at no one and let the joy

of this encounter fill me

like music, but no voices

or distant trains echo

in this hallowed wood. Absence

is the thing that calls us back

to places emptied of

everything but remembrance.

My father taught me to listen

for God in the silence

of the earth, unencumbered

and filling with light

This morning, the hornet’s nest

hanging from a low beech branch,

where Maple Trail opens to

a logging road, could be a sign

of something ominous,

but there is a green stillness

brightening the air and church

bells chiming in the distance,

aunts and uncles walking

down the hotel stairs for breakfast,

cousins on the porch, waiting

for the sun, and plenty

of time to pray alone.

The Christmas Apron

Unfolding my grandmother’s apron, tucked

deep in a box of Christmas decorations,

I rub my hands across the wrinkled

cream colored cloth as thin as gauze

and the bright red and blue boxes circling

the hem and see her standing at the stove

wearing her Christmas apron, stirring pots

on every burner, a turkey already roasting

in the oven, plates of gingerbread men

cooling on the counter. Each one her own

creation. Dozens of cousins, aunts, and uncles

circle the kitchen table in a haze

of coffee, bacon, and cigarettes. Damp wool

hats and mittens steam on the radiator

beneath the kitchen windows thick with frost.

My grandfather hauls in wood in from the shed,

smelling of pipe smoke and peppermints,

shaking fresh snow from his plaid flannel sleeves.

It’s as if my childhood was inscribed

on this stained handful of cloth, scattered

with a celebration of ornaments

tied with green ribbon and a tiny tag pinned

at the waistband—This was Nana’s apron.

Corene

summer flowing like a song

only she can hear standing

in the tilting tall grass that is

singing also a woman holds

a blue polka dot sheet

overhead as if it is

a privilege to be standing

in an open field with wind

lifting her dress while she

dries baskets of clean laundry

beneath a sun filled sky

Easter Worry

This morning, the churchyard is covered

in a dusting of pollen as if a light snow

fell during the night, changing everything it touched.

And the world emerged thrumming and green.

Who knows what part the wind played or where

it comes from, how it swirls the bees into a lazy spin

above the garden and lifts the sparrows to their nest

on a window ledge beneath the eaves. The sky fills

with winged creatures, magnolia blossoms, sweet

notes of familiar hymns, and all the unutterable prayers—

for the child that never phones, the neighbor

with a spot on her lung, the father who cannot be pleased.

Much is said today about the meaning

of the mystery. I think of it as something

remembered then shared, like a small nest

holding everything we lov...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half title
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword
• From Noticing Eden, 2003
• From Despite Gravity, 2007
• From The Endless Repetition of an Ordinary Miracle, 2010
• New Poems
• Notes and Acknowledgments