Dwight Gray’s “Mapmaking” makes the simple act of a child drawing appear as profound and miraculous as any myth of creation and destruction.
—
Mapmaking
With an empty page a boy begins to build,
thumb and forefinger swing the nib like shovel and pik,
and in the wake a sea of black forms the world.
Lines waver, asymmetric, into battered shores –
soon the line turns, turns again and closes upon itself,
beginning meets end, earth rises. the ink dark sea falls.
Random towns appear, and hills marked by contour lines;
blue river runs through center, then fans into a delta.
An occasional boat leaves no trace, nor the fanged sea
serpent the boy has drawn to mark the paper’s edge.
Soon, color arrives, these right-angled roads form silver
boundaries, apply order to unruly trees, the green anarchy
of grass. Finally the small hand sprinkles the world
rectangle buildings and stick men, stand in parallel, stick arms open,
and when he sees that it is good, he carries his world
to the kitchen table, where the adults have kept busy
speaking of news while slicing storing summer’s last harvest
of wild tomatoes into Mason jars. Before anyone can stop
its fall, the world on paper sinks on the wooden surface
only to have the red of fresh cut fruit, rise through its center.
***
Editor’s Note: Dwight Gray is a favorite at The Good Men Project. Read his excellent poems “Orange” and “The Butcher.”
Interested in submitting poetry to The Good Men Project? Check out our guidelines.
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Photo by SanderGerinckx /Flickr
Interested in submitting poetry to The Good Men Project? Check out our guidelines.
Like The Good Men Project on Facebook
Photo by mattyeo /Flickr
– See more at: https://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/chb-the-butcher/#sthash.1N4ZmUly.dpuf
Interested in submitting poetry to The Good Men Project? Check out our guidelines.
Like The Good Men Project on Facebook
Photo by JoeInQueens /Flickr
– See more at: https://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/chb-august-goes-like-gold/#sthash.K1ukfCE4.dpuf
***
Editor’s Note: Laura McCullough has published with us before. Read her wonderful poems “Trance” and “Late Spring, Dignity.”
Interested in submitting poetry to The Good Men Project? Check out our guidelines.
Like The Good Men Project on Facebook
Photo by JoeInQueens /Flickr
– See more at: https://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/chb-august-goes-like-gold/#sthash.K1ukfCE4.dpuf
***
Editor’s Note: Laura McCullough has published with us before. Read her wonderful poems “Trance” and “Late Spring, Dignity.”
Interested in submitting poetry to The Good Men Project? Check out our guidelines.
Like The Good Men Project on Facebook
Photo by JoeInQueens /Flickr
– See more at: https://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/chb-august-goes-like-gold/#sthash.K1ukfCE4.dpuf
***
Editor’s Note: Laura McCullough has published with us before. Read her wonderful poems “Trance” and “Late Spring, Dignity.”
Interested in submitting poetry to The Good Men Project? Check out our guidelines.
Like The Good Men Project on Facebook
Photo by JoeInQueens /Flickr
– See more at: https://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/chb-august-goes-like-gold/#sthash.K1ukfCE4.dpuf
***
Editor’s Note: Laura McCullough has published with us before. Read her wonderful poems “Trance” and “Late Spring, Dignity.”
Interested in submitting poetry to The Good Men Project? Check out our guidelines.
Like The Good Men Project on Facebook
Photo by JoeInQueens /Flickr
– See more at: https://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/chb-august-goes-like-gold/#sthash.K1ukfCE4.dpuf
***
Editor’s Note: Laura McCullough has published with us before. Read her wonderful poems “Trance” and “Late Spring, Dignity.”
Interested in submitting poetry to The Good Men Project? Check out our guidelines.
Like The Good Men Project on Facebook
Photo by JoeInQueens /Flickr
– See more at: https://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/chb-august-goes-like-gold/#sthash.K1ukfCE4.dpuf