{"id":2204,"date":"2017-02-16T00:00:13","date_gmt":"2017-02-16T05:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/mission-and-identity\/?p=2204"},"modified":"2019-09-18T16:47:19","modified_gmt":"2019-09-18T20:47:19","slug":"each-object-which-your-eyes-beheld","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/2017\/02\/16\/each-object-which-your-eyes-beheld\/","title":{"rendered":"each object which your eyes beheld"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today I share love poems written by Broadside Press authors Gwendolyn Brooks and S. Carolyn Reese. Brooks is likely familiar to some list readers but Reese, a Detroit-based poet, may be a new voice. She was to me. I discovered her work in the Dudley Randall Broadside Press special collection<\/a>, archived in the Detroit Mercy McNichols Campus Library.<\/p>\n

It was the first time I had gone through the complete material archive. Although I have read many of the works in reproduction, it was something else entirely to hold each original broadside, chapbook, or volume in my hands.<\/p>\n

Reese\u2019s \u201cLetter from a Wife,\u201d published by Broadside in 1967, was written to her husband while he was in Mississippi working in support of civil rights actions. Both Reese\u2019s poem and \u00a0Gwendolyn Brooks\u2019s \u201cwhen you have forgotten Sunday: the love story\u201d reveal the complete material ways \u00a0lovers come to imbue our lives\u2014through the things we hold that are filled and emptied by love.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cLetter from a Wife\u201d
\nS. Carolyn Reese<\/p>\n

I retrace your path in my bare feet
\nPress my lips against your empty cup
\nTouch your clothes for now-gone warmth
\nView each object which your eyes beheld
\nWrite your name and speak the same
\nI bless each day you elude the pack
\nRehearse each word of love we spoke
\nRecall the vows your eyes declared
\nYour last touch lingers with me still
\nI face each day with dragging feet-weary heart
\nApart-from-you takes half my strength
\nThe rest I need for waiting.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cwhen you have forgotten Sunday: the love story\u201d
\nGwendolyn Brooks<\/p>\n

—-And when you have forgotten the bright bedclothes
\non a Wednesday and a Saturday,
\nAnd most especially when you have forgotten Sunday—-
\nWhen you have forgotten Sunday halves in bed,
\nOr me sitting on the front-room radiator in the limping afternoon
\nLooking off down the long street
\nTo nowhere,
\nHugged by my plain old wrapper of no-expectation
\nAnd nothing-I-have-to-do and I’m-happy-why?
\nAnd if-Monday-never-had-to-come—-
\nWhen you have forgotten that, I say,
\nAnd how you swore, if somebody beeped the bell,
\nAnd how my heart played hopscotch if the telephone rang;
\nAnd how we finally went in to Sunday dinner,
\nThat is to say, went across the front room floor to the ink-spotted table in the southwest corner
\nTo Sunday dinner, which was always chicken and noodles
\nOr chicken and rice
\nAnd salad and rye bread and tea
\nAnd chocolate chip cookies—–
\nI say, when you have forgotten that,
\nWhen you have forgotten my little presentiment
\nThat the war would be over before they got to you;
\nAnd how we finally undressed and whipped out the light and flowed into bed,
\nAnd lay loose-limbed for a moment in the week-end
\nBright bedclothes,
\nThen gently folded into each other—–
\nWhen you have, I say, forgotten all that,
\nThen you may tell,
\nThen I may believe
\nYou have forgotten me well.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Original 1967\u00a0broadside of “Letter from a Wife”
\n<\/strong>with many thanks to Associate Librarian\u00a0Pat Higo and the Dudley Randall Broadside Press\u00a0special collection<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Rosemary Weatherston, Ph.D.
\nAssociate Professor of English
\nDirector, Women’s & Gender Studies Program
\nDirector, Dudley Randall Center for Print Culture<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today I share love poems written by Broadside Press authors Gwendolyn Brooks and S. Carolyn Reese. Brooks is likely familiar to some list readers but Reese, a Detroit-based poet, may be a new voice. She was to me. I discovered … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":139,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[11641],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2204"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/139"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2204"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2204\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2206,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2204\/revisions\/2206"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}