About the Episode
We know Valentine’s Day has passed, but we hope you enjoy this episode as The Author’s Inscape’s homage to the month of love. Brydee will be the guest host for today’s episode full of love poems. Brooke Miller, a volunteer at Inscape: A literary Journal, will be reading two poems by Hollie Dugas and one poem by Dante Di Stefano, both accomplished poets.
Music Credit: Alia Alexander
Header Image: Promise Me by Torrin Omokoh, Inscape Fall 2024
Transcription
(Music playing.)
Brydee: Hello, and welcome back to The Author’s Inscape! My name is Brydee and I’m a guest host for this episode. Today, we will be reading three poems previously published in Inscape Journal, all of which are centered on love. Valentine’s Day may have passed, but February is not over. So join us to enjoy an homage to the month of love.
The first poem for today is entitled “Love Poem to a Heartbroken Zombie” by Hollie Dugas. So, without further ado, Brooke Miller reading “Love Poem to a Heartbroken Zombie.”
(Music ends.)
Brooke Miller:
“Love Poem to a Heartbroken Zombie” by Hollie Dugas.
Let’s get you some paper, you can paint
me organless if that’s what turns you on.
Wear my small intestines around
your neck like a medal. I’ll follow
you through the streets, a weeping wound
in your flesh, watching you ingest
your feelings. They say
you’re a monster. But don’t let it
get you down; you are free, cut off
from convention, simple and wild,
led by desire, to consume the pith
of the living, make art, dance.
Besides, would you rather be one
of them, having to eat up
all your vegetables? Come, let’s finish
our lives together. It doesn’t matter
how dead you get; I am indebted
to you now—a man who has come
back out of love. I’ll reach my hand
into those sticky lungs, fish out
any ache you have. Take my hand
and whirl me for a spin,
I’ll land in your arms every time.
Brydee: Thank you, Brooke! What a fun and creative poem! The author, Hollie Dugas, has been published in various places and has even been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and for inclusion in Best New Poets. She is from New Mexico and is actually the author of our next poem, “Connoisseur of Hearts.”
(Music starts.)
(Music ends.)
BM:
“Connoisseur of Hearts” by Hollie Dugas.
I discover them in all types
and in the strangest of places,
muddled grapes at the bottom
of wine, barnacles in oceans—
independent from body,
they flop with impulse
like fat snappers. And with
each scarlet kernel I collect
in net, I lick salty tears
from wounds, and check
for pulse, pushing my fingers
into electricity—the meaty
organ spittling its broken
messages. I hug every wild
quivering core near my ear,
the carmine shells, to locate
the buffalo’s thunder
that is my match—each pith
stampeding to be part
of something bigger.
Last night, I sat on the love-
seat, trying to warm
yself. I did not fill any
voids but I practiced heart,
clasped together my smaller
than average hands,
an unfamiliar arthropod,
and squeezed 115,000
times over, studying
the gaps in my heartline,
how much space was left
pen—the thread breaking
and unbreaking, a web
too difficult to climb.
Brydee: Our last poem for this episode is titled “Poem For My Wife, Christina, on Our 8th Wedding Anniversary” by Dante Di Stefano. Stefano is the author of five poetry collections and a chapbook. Stefano’s poem is a beautiful depiction, describing years with a lover, our perfect ending to this small collection of love poems.
(Music starts.)
(Music ends.)
BM:
“Poem For My Wife, Christina, on Our 8th Wedding Anniversary” by Dante Di Stefano.
You’re awake in the kitchen
and I’ve just gotten up in
the bedroom. The children are
sleeping still in their separate
rooms. Soon, we’ll all start our day
together. Our daughter will
scribble fire on looseleaf as
our son crawls across the floor,
which our daughter will say is
lava, but which doesn’t burn
her brother because he is
a fireproof baby-vampire,
she says, and I’m a daddy-
vampire, and you’re a mommy-
witch, and the dog’s a werewolf.
And everything is magic
on this ordinary day
in early August, although we
don’t note it. And toward dark,
I will plant a tree for you.
We’re like everybody else
outside of poems: so much
eddies around us each day,
but here in this poem I
am a stone and you are a
stone and we are enjambed so
imperfectly under the
soil of this maple sapling,
our son laughing, our daughter
crayoning at the table,
the dog dreaming a blood moon,
our hands become hummingbirds,
our hands become stone statues
of hummingbirds, become roots,
Tuesdays, Augusts of their own.
Brydee: This concludes our homage to the month of love. Thank you to our authors and to Brooke for reading our poems. Tune in March 6th for an interview with published poet Lance Larsen. Thank you for listening to The Authors Inscape Podcast!
(Music playing.)
Starly Pratt: Hello, I’m Starly Pratt, and I want to thank you for listening to this episode of The Author’s Inscape, a podcast hosted by Inscape, a literary journal. We’d like to give a special thanks to the English department at Brigham Young University, our host institution, and to Alia Alexander for writing and producing the music in this episode. If you are interested in more episodes or want to learn more about our journal, please head to our website: inscape.byu.edu. Thanks again for listening.
(Music ends.)
