by Julie Berry (for Poetry Month)
When an unfamiliar word flies up and startles you, look for identifying features, try to glimpse its secondaries, comprehend its bone structure, its under-tail coverts. To know it better is to love it more.
You may know the song a word sings but listen as if you’re hearing it for the first time. A simple honk may be all you’re looking for but you won’t know until it distinguishes itself flying over your head in a noisy flock of onomatopoeia.
Or one syllable sings all night, fading with the stars at the end of the last stanza and only then do you see it’s not the word you thought it was — like when you believe for your whole life the single note sung on August nights is one hundred percent crickets when really, it’s thousands of crickets in the field next door and a grasshopper lark in the hedge.
Be demanding and don’t hesitate to rap the knuckles of lazy words. Expect them to show initiative, and if they don’t, treat them like the youngest sons in fairy tales. Send them on absurdly difficult errands.
How many times have you found a dead word in the margin, or by the side of a worn-out refrain? There’s no question it’s dead but it’s like birds on the gravel shoulders of busy highways that look like they’ve fallen asleep. If you find such a word, consider taking it home.
Standing still in fields, getting through thickets of bramble without too much bleeding, or staying dry while crossing a creek all take practice. If quicksand is encountered do not struggle. When the poem is sucking you down, spread yourself out and make yourself as light as you can. Yes, you may lose your boots – maybe even your jacket. That’s okay. Lie back. Relax.