FEATURED POEM––Offering
FEATURE POEM: “Offering”
I shot this photo in 2014 in the market of Chichicastenango in the western highlands of Guatemala. Seven years later, I began the first draft of the poem that would become “Offering,” which the Atlanta Review has published in their Fall 2024 issue.
This image haunted me, and I’m not surprised it took so long to surface and articulate why.
“Offering” is my second appearance in the Atlanta Review, and I’m grateful for their publication of my work.
Enjoy.
OFFERING
In Guatemala, in Chichicastenango,
flower sellers lined the steps rising to the doors
of the Iglesia de Santo Tomás.
The Maya who came to market left offerings
on the stairs of incense, maize, and bottles of rum
wrapped in corn husks.
In a smokey, perfumed haze, a young girl stood
cloaked, looking into the distance,
imagining her future, perhaps, as your son may have
gathering kindling in the morning mist, Abraham,
unaware he was your intended sacrifice.
May the shame of all the ages stain your name,
may it fall forever on you––you who would
have done the deed had a hand not stayed you,
you who should have cried, I will not,
will not do this thing you ask,
not even for you, Lord.
READ SOME OTHER POEMS (Click on the hot-linked grey text)
“Boy Jumping Off a Cliff,” “Audrey Hepburn and the Southern Belle Soirée,” and “Highway at Night,” South Florida Poetry Journal, May 2024
“A Friend Writes from Paris” and “Inventory,” The Inquisitive Eater (New School Food), 2024
“Red Geraniums,” The Rainbow Project (Poets Wear Prada)
“Act III” and “Lo Stadio dei Marmi, Rome," Inlandia Journal
“Sonnet with Birch Trees, Tatars, and Crayolas” Cider Press Review, Vol.25 Issue #1
“Vocabulary Lesson,” Verse Daily
“Somewhere in Georgia” and “Belated Valentine for Alex,” Under a Warm Green Linden
“The Death of Heidegger,” Penn Review
“Christ of the Frogs, with Thieves,” “Catchment,” and “Operating Instructions” Full Bleed, (Maryland Institute College of Art)
“On the Sayville Ferry,” The Westchester Review
“Boy, Stepping from the Shower, a Towel around His Waist,” Full Bleed, (Maryland Institute College of Art)
“December 31st,” The Inquisitive Eater (New School Food)
“At the Precise Moment of the Solstice” and “First Encounter,” Marathon Literary Review (Arcadia University, Philadelphia)
“Monet vs. The International Pop Art Exhibit,” Honorable Mention, E. E. Cummings Prize, New England Poetry Club.
“Cytokinesophobia,” Palette Poetry
“At the Shrine of Moinuddin Chisti,” Podium, an online publication of the Unterberg Poetry Center at New York’s 92nd StreetY
“Beneath Me,” all the sins
“Questions for Anthropophogists” - The Inquisitive Eater (New School Food)
“Predilections of the Carnivores” - The Inquisitive Eater (New School Food)
“Self-Driving Tesla Involved in Fatal Crash” - New Verse News
“Correction” - New Verse News