{"id":2518,"date":"2019-12-06T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-12-06T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/?p=2518"},"modified":"2019-12-15T22:29:16","modified_gmt":"2019-12-16T02:29:16","slug":"featured-poem-fragile-by-jennifer-g-kivikko","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/2019\/12\/06\/featured-poem-fragile-by-jennifer-g-kivikko\/","title":{"rendered":"Weekly Feature | Fragile by Gayle J. Greenlea"},"content":{"rendered":"
photo : Peter Shefler, visual artist and poet<\/span><\/span><\/h6>\n

We collide in a tender fugue
\n<\/span>reeds with slender necks
\njostling against each other by wind
\nand circumstance\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

We are fragile
\nbeings rushing through time
\nas if it were of no consequence
\nbumps and bruises crushing\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

red stains into our skin
\npanes where air is thin
\nand the soul breathes
\nmore visibly <\/span><\/p>\n

purpura witnessing
\nwhere words will not
\nHow we suffer from small
\nwounds <\/span><\/p>\n

we inflict unconsciously
\nintentional tramplings
\nin the fields. We wield
\npower carelessly <\/span><\/p>\n

or not at all, watch silently
\nas another brother
\ngoes down; a sister falls
\nin the moonlight <\/span><\/p>\n

Oh, the terrible ways we fail
\neach other, refusing to speak
\nallowing the wind to carry our pain
\nover the horizon in soundless <\/span><\/p>\n

ripples until — like wolves drawn to blood —
\nthe ones with scythes come to cut
\nour necks and leave us rootless
\nfrom the land<\/span><\/p>\n

…<\/span><\/p>\n

Artist Statement: <\/strong>Art has a unique ability, even responsibility, to wake people up, to help them engage emotionally with fearful and disturbing subjects, and hopefully, stir them to action. Pablo Neruda said, ‘Poetry is bread’ and a tool for justice. I believe language is powerful and that poetry can indeed play a role in justice-making and social change.<\/em><\/h6>\n
Gayle J. Greenlea <\/strong>is an award-winning poet and counselor for survivors of sexual and gender-related violence. Her poem, “Wonderland\u201d, received the Australian Poetry Prod Award in 2011. She shortlisted and longlisted for the Fish Poetry Prize in 2013, and debuted her first novel, Zero Gravity, at the KGB Literary Bar in Manhattan in 2016. Her work has been published in St. Julian Press, Rebelle Society, A Time to Speak, Astronomy Magazine and The Australian Health Review.<\/em><\/h6>\n
<\/h6>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

photo : Peter Shefler, visual artist and poet We collide in a tender fugue reeds with slender necks jostling against each other by wind and …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2519,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sfsi_plus_gutenberg_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_show_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_type":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_alignemt":"","sfsi_plus_gutenburg_max_per_row":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2,167,177,170,213,172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-weekly-feature","category-gun-violence","category-humanity-of-it-all","category-health","category-poetry","category-race"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/image4.jpeg?fit=626%2C942&ssl=1","post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2518"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2518\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3301,"href":"https:\/\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2518\/revisions\/3301"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lineriderpress.com\/headlinepoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}