April is National Poetry Month so each Thursday this month we will share a poem from one of our poetry books. This week’s poem is by Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, from her collection Fat Art, Thin Art, published in 1994. This short poem showcases Sedgwick’s humor.
Not
I didn’t put in for a transfer to this planet,
I can assure you. I did assure
my parents of this over and over
when I was a kid, which endeared me tenderly
to them. I’m sure.
It was the most raucous, outraged thing
I owned: the wish not to be
with its coarse baby sarcasms I treasured,
not to be and not to reproduce.
Did I imagine with the perfect
sneer or shrug that I could buy
myself the privilege of looking
sad? Duh. Like I would.
