Part 2: In Honor of National Poetry Month
APRIL 7, 2007 Listen to this Story
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To honor National Poetry Month, Weekend America will be spotlighting poetry all month long. In this installment we hear from Danielle Legros Georges, a Haitain-American poet in Boston. She shares her poem "How to Kiss."
"How to Kiss," by Danielle Legros Georges
The children know how to kiss,
to descend stairwells when called
into rooms of colored lips
whispered entendres, demure smiles,
the uncle who an Kreyol calls us
"kochon mawon,""wild pigs."
We walk into crooned comment va tu
uus rolling too long from gold-filled
mouths,
thistly jowls. We kiss
the cheek, the next cheek, and more
cheeks, the odors of Vitalis
(the smart man's hair tonic),
of Bain de Champagne, Chanel No. 5,
Eau de Floride, of various adult eau.
We bristle in advance against the teenager
whose five-o'-clock shadow goes
from sun-yard
to sit in parlors, his knees eclipsed in
cloth,
a foreshadow that we too would be
the kissed.
But Pascale had the audacity, once,
to alter form, opening her mouth
to snake a tongue that swept
beige powder from the face of Madame
Altagrace LaVache, exposing a patch
of brown from chin to ear.
"Un véritable scandale."
"Tongue on cheek?!"
"Truth indeed, the wild pigs!"
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- Music Bridge:
- Lost Message
- Artist: Air
- CD: Pocket Symphony (Astralwerks)
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From Greenbelt, MD, 04/15/2008
Greenbelt Writers Group Celebrates National Poetry Month
*Original & Favorite Poems
*Music & Song
*Open Mic
Saturday, April 19, 2008 -- 2:00
Greenbelt Branch Public Library
11 Crescent Road
Greenbelt, MD 20770
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