“The Hotel Eden” by Beverly Bie Brahic (poetry, ’06)

An excerpt from “The Hotel Eden” by Beverly Bie Brahic (poetry, ’06), published at The American Journal of Poetry:

The Hotel Eden

      after Joseph Cornell

Fragments of a life, protected under glass:

A parrot on its perch, a crock of corks. Butt-end of an egg.

The spring from a gutted clock.

This poster for Eden

Scorched and brittle as a boy’s treasure map.

            On the tip of God’s tongue, the bird waits to be named.

            Profoundly silent, the taxidermist’s shop.  ‘If only,’ thinks the bird.

            If only what?

[…continue reading here]