Three Poems by Denise Duhamel

POEM IN WHICH I WRESTLE WITH AUTOBIOGRAPHY

I always wanted to write what was true, True, true blue
to not only the facts, but my feelings about those facts,
which makes me wonder why I became a poet
whose mind could go anywhere. I mostly stayed
in the raw material of my life. One critic wrote
that my poems were too raw and, in shame,
I made my own simile—my poems were like a plate
of eggs. Even the whites were runny. Where was my artistry?
What came first? The chicken or my lousy poem?
A long time ago, a professor told me each verse should pass
the “so what?” test and for a while, in rebellion,
I added that question to the endings of famous poems.
I have wasted my life. So what? and Or does it explode? So what?
and Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know. So what?
I was bratty and defensive. My life events were worse
than those of others, but better than many. I fetishized
my childhood trauma, maybe traumatizing my readers.
I became aloof, scared really, when a reader told me
about similar problems of her own. Her autobiography
seemed too real because it wasn’t in the form of a poem.

*

POEM IN WHICH MY ACHES ARE HIDING STORIES

My left pinkie goes numb—inside it
a tiny majorette twirls her baton.
She flips it into the air and it knocks her
head on its way down. She collapses
in all her spangles and I can’t wake her up.
The sciatic nerve runs down my right leg—
in my hip, a luau out of control.
One of the fire dancers misses his throw
and sets aflame a hula girl’s skirt.
Everyone sprints to the exit, panicked,
pushing and shoving in my calf.
And my sore shoulders?—this is where
I am inside myself carrying a backpack
full of rocks. Each one is engraved
with my sins, ungrateful, disloyal, selfish.
They clunk and clash and my therapist
is relieved. Finally a story about me.

*

POEM IN WHICH I REALIZE I AM NOT THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE

I notice shadows of swaying palms on concrete
seaweed clumping like tiny islands at the shore
a lime iguana on the stair
a sea grape squished by a bike tire
a woman crying        a rust stain under the gutter       the sky
an embryo cloud a dinosaur cloud
another woman crying as I disappear

*

Denise Duhamel’s most recent books of poetry are Pink Lady (Pitt Poetry Series, 2025), Second Story (2021) and Scald (2017). Blowout (2013) was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. A distinguished university professor in the MFA program at Florida International University in Miami, she lives in Dania Beach.