A House Called Tomorrow: Fifty Years of Poetry from Copper Canyon Press

By Copper Canyon Press

Copper Canyon Press celebrates its first 50 years of poetry publishing in anticipation of the next 50 years.

Poetry is vital to language and living. This anthology celebrates 50 years of Copper Canyon Press publications, one extraordinary poem at a time. Since its founding, Copper Canyon has been entirely dedicated to publishing poetry books; here Editor in Chief Michael Wiegers invites press staff and board—past and present—to help curate a retrospective. The result is a collection of beloved poems from books spanning half a century: representing Pulitzer Prize-winning books, debut collections, works in translation, and rare books from Copper Canyon’s early days. This book is a tribute to Copper Canyon poets and readers everywhere, because, as Gregory Orr writes, “Certain poems / In an uncertain world— / The ones we cling to: // They bring us back.”

• Language: English
• Publisher: Copper Canyon Press
• Release date: Feb 28, 2023
• ISBN: 9781619322684

Book preview

1973–1979

GERALD COSTANZO

from Badlands: First Poems, 1973

Everything You Own

Sometimes I think you’re

from the South. You speak

with that drawl. You move

slowly as if taken by heat.

There are burning desires,

strange elevations you

never overcome. Everything

you own is in your

pockets. I see you in the

drugstore down on Main,

sipping soda, spitting

tobacco, mopping your brow.

You could tell me what this

country needs.

ROBERT HEDIN

from Snow Country, 1975

Transcanadian

At this speed, my friend, our origins are groundless.

We are nearing the eve of a great festival,

The festival of wind.

Already you can see this road weakening.

Soon it will breathe

And lift away to dry its feathers in the air.

On both sides the fields of rape seed and sunflowers

Are revolting against their rows.

Soon they will scatter wildly like pheasants.

Now is the time, my friend, to test our souls.

We must let them forage for themselves,

But first—unbuckle your skin.

It is out here, in the darkness

Between two shimmering cities,

That we have, perhaps for the last time, chance

Neither to be shut nor open,

But to let our souls speak and carry our bodies like capes.

W.M. RANSOM

from Waving Arms at the Blind, 1975

Pastime Café

The eyes in this place droop

thick puckers under the eyes

folds under necks droop

jowls and the plants in the windows

droop plants in the pictures on the walls

droop cigars in racks

bowling trophies, unmatched silver droops

this table and its cracked vinyl chairs

droop warm salads, year-old crackers

droop my tired hands droop

Eddy Arnold droops from the jukebox

I wake up away from you again

and my whole body droops.

GLADYS CARDIFF

from To Frighten a Storm, 1976

Combing

Bending, I bow my head

and lay my hands upon

her hair, combing, and think

how women do this for

each other. My daughter’s hair

curls against the comb,

wet and fragrant—orange

parings. Her face, downcast,

is quiet for one so young.

I take her place. Beneath

my mother’s hands I feel

the braids drawn up tight

as piano wires and singing,

vinegar-rinsed. Sitting

before the oven I hear

the orange coils tick

the early hour before school.

She combed her grandmother

Mathilda’s hair using

a comb made out of bone.

Mathilda rocked her oak wood

chair, her face downcast,

intent on tearing rags

in strips to braid a cotton

rug from bits of orange

and brown. A simple act

preparing hair. Something

women do for each other,

plaiting the generations.

RICHARD HUGO

from Duwamish Head, 1976

Neighbor

The drunk who lives across the street from us

fell in our garden, on the beet patch

yesterday. So polite. Pardon me,

he said. He had to be helped up and held,

steered home and put to bed, declaring

we got to have another drink and smile.

I admit my envy. xxxviii found him in salal

and flat on his face in lettuce, and bent

and snoring by that thick stump full of rain

we used to sail destroyers on.

And I’ve carried him home so often

stone to the rain and me, and cheerful.

I try to guess what’s in that dim warm mind.

Does he think about horizoned firs

black against the light, thirty years

ago, and the good girl—what’s her name—

believing, or think about the dog

he beat to death that day in Carbonado?

I hear he’s dead, and wait now on my porch.

He must be in his shack. The wagon’s

due to come and take him where they take

late alcoholics, probably called Farm’s End.

I plan my frown, certain he’ll be carried out

bleeding from the corners of his grin.

T.E. JAY

from River Dogs, 1976

Fir

He eats rain

and the shared light

of a single star.

The far-rooted wind

blesses and terrifies him

in turn.

His slow fire burns greener

than a great cat’s eye.

Blind as the sky,

he never sleeps

but his dreams

can make it snow.

KENNETH REXROTH

from The Silver Swan: Poems Written in Kyoto, 1974–75, 1976

As the full moon rises

As the full moon rises

The swan sings

In sleep

On the lake of the mind

GEORGE HITCHCOCK

from The Piano Beneath the Skin, 1978

Solitaire

all that winter you were gone

the skylarks went on crutches

I woke up every dawn

to crows quarreling in ditches

I’d been there before I knew

that landscape of demented kings

I’d seen the courtiers in blue

masks and idiot posturings

when you’re nailed to a scar

you don’t think much of fine words

the jugglers at the bazaar

or the man who eats swords

the world’s deceptive—too many

crafty smiling bones

eyes masquerading in money

and loquacious spoons

so I said goodbye to the foxtrot

and to badminton in the park

I shuffle the deck and deal out

snowflakes in the dark

DAVID LEE

from The Porcine Legacy, 1978

For Jan, with Love

1

John he comes to my house

pulls his beat-up truck in my drive

and honks

Dave John sez Dave my red sow

she got pigs stuck and my big hands they won’t go

and I gotta get them pigs out

or that fucker she’s gonna die

and I sez John goddam

we’ll be right down and John sez Jan

he yells JAN where’s Jan she’s got little hands

she can get in there and pull them pigs

and I sez Jan and he sez Jan and Jan comes

what? Jan sez and John sez tell Jan Dave

and I sez Jan John’s red sow’s got pigs

stuck and his hand’s too big and won’t go

and he’s gotta get them pigs out

or that fucker’s gonna die (John he turns

his head and lights a cigarette)

(he don’t say fuck to no woman)

and Jan she sez well let’s go

and we get in John’s beat-up damn truck

and go to pull John’s pigs

2

John’s red sow she doesn’t weigh

a hundred and sixty pounds

but he bred her to his biggest boar

and had to put haybales by her sides

so the boar wouldn’t break

her back because Carl bet five dollars

he couldn’t and John he bet

five she could and John he won

but Carl enjoyed watching anyway

3

John’s red sow was laying

on her side hurting bad

and we could see she had a pig

right there but it wouldn’t come she

was too small and John sez see

and I sez I see that pig’s gotta come out

or that fucker’s gonna die

and Jan puts vaseline on her hands

and sez hold her legs and I hold her legs

and Jan goes in after the pig

and John gets out of the pen and goes

somewheres else

Jan she pulls like hell pretty soon

the pig come big damn big little pig

dead and I give Jan more vaseline and she goes

back in to see about any more

and John’s red sow pushes hard on Jan’s arm

up to her elbow inside and Jan sez

there’s more help me and I help

another pig damn big damn dead comes

and John’s red sow she seems better

and we hope that’s all

4

John’s red sow won’t go

out of labor so we stay all