ISSN: 1941-4137
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
Alicia Winokur is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College and lives in Boston with her very noisy cat. Her poetry has appeared in Hobart Pulp, Synaesthesia Magazine, and Crab Fat Magazine.
Previously in Glass: A Journal of Poetry:
they want her to carry a gun
const reminder = true;
let memory = ['it', 'this', 'him'];
// press on the bruise to make sure
// it hurts
for (let memoryIndex = 0; memoryIndex < memory.length; memoryIndex++) {
console.log('I don\'t want to talk about ' +memory[memoryIndex] +'.');
}
// something has made a home
// growing
const memoryPainful = true;
// under jaundiced skin the body knows
// how to protect itself from another blow
function notReady() {
if (memoryPainful) {
return 'Can we change the subject?';
}
}
// someone once told you this is called an acellular exudate
// (like it meant anything to call it by its name)
// and it will rise
function changeSubject() {
console.log('Let\'s talk about something else.');
}
// high a peak of inflammation among
// blue-black dapples some bulging
if (notReady()) {
changeSubject();
} else {
talkAboutIt = true;
}
// hardened spot that will nest
// until the day
var currentDate = new Date();
var startTime = currentDate.getTime()
// fingertips search for the familiar
// hills sunk back into vessels
var running = true
while (running) {
var nextDate = new Date();
var currentTime = nextDate.getTime();
if (currentTime - startTime >= Integer.random) {
running = false
console.log('I\'m ready to talk about ' +memory[memoryIndex] +'.');
}
}
// no one ever told you the word for when
// it stops hurting
I started seriously writing poetry when I started learning JavaScript. Someone gave me the advice to think of code as a foreign language with its own grammar, syntax, and nuances, which inspired me to try combining it with poetry. My intent is for readers to try and understand whichever aspect they may be less familiar with through the context of the other. The poem can be read three ways: solely as a poem, solely as executable code, or together (the poem can even be run through a console!).
Glass: A Journal of Poetry is published monthly by Glass Poetry Press.
All contents © the author.
All contents © the author.
