When I was a childthe Teton Dam broke.Everyone lost their carpet.The mildew wouldn’t stop blossoming. Over time, everything got better.People bought more dogs.I loved the yippy ones most.Tiny and fierce and shitting everywhere. My closet was so small.I had almost no clothes.We were rich in other ways.My grandparents owned a speedboat. And here I am today, timidaround water, but enduring.Responsibly burying everyone I loveinto that dry earth.
Autobiography
Kristen Tracy
What need does matter have to be witnessed by anyone?Levi Bryant
Feature Date
- February 10, 2019
Series
Selected By
Share This Poem
Print This Poem
Copyright © 2019 by Kristen Tracy.
All rights reserved.
Reproduced by Poetry Daily with permission.
Kristen Tracy grew up in a small Mormon farming community in Idaho. Tracy earned an MA in American Literature from Brigham Young University, an MFA from Vermont College, and a PhD in English from Western Michigan University. Her poems have appeared in over two dozen literary journals.
Tracy won the 2017 Emily Dickinson First Book Award for her manuscript Half-Hazard, which was previously a finalist for the Yale Younger Poets Prize and a semi-finalist for the Walt Whitman Award.
On The Seawall is a community gallery for new writing and commentary during a time of emergency. (There always is, and there always has been, an emergency.)
I launched On The Seawall in 2007 as a site for my personal page and occasional comment, but as my involvement with commentary grew along with the size of the site’s readership, On The Seawall soon evolved into a regularly refreshed book review site. In the spring of 2018, as the old and unfixable code underlying the site began to break down, I considered three options: shut down, rebuild On The Seawall as it stands, or apply the resource and direct the site’s audience to a broader purpose. After discussing the potential with my friends, I decided to relaunch On The Seawall to accommodate diverse commentary, new writing across genres, and art. In particular, the site ]presents and discusses poetry, lyrical and speculative fiction, literature in translation, and cultural expression via essays and reviews.
We are living in a time of emergency during which our art may act as performances of intervention. Back in 2007, I titled this site On The Seawall for a reason — because there is always an emergency, communal and/or personal, requiring a stay against the flood.
Joining me in this effort are several contributing editors:
Daisy Fried, Tarfia Faizullah, Dean Rader, Kyle Dargan, Elaine Sexton, Mark Athitakis, Lisa Russ Spaar, Andrew Epstein, Victoria Chang, Kimberly Grey, Philip Metres, Laura Marris, David Roderick, Airea Matthews, Jonathan Farmer. and Michael Lindgren.
Poetry Daily Depends on You
With your support, we make reading the best contemporary poetry a treasured daily experience. Consider a contribution today.