Irises Unfinished — Clock Counting

AUTHOR NARRATION

Hear the poem.

Read by the author in the original English.

Irises UnfinishedEnglish narration

BRUNCH, REARRANGED

Splashed Shuffled

In a few places in this collection, I let the words on the page do what they describe: this is one of them.

instantly splashed shuffled intoBloodyice cubesMary

Move your cursor over the image or tap it; with a keyboard, press Enter or Space. Tap again to return to the first glance.

A PROOFREADER’S MARK

The Stet Blip

In proofreading, stet is an instruction to keep the text exactly as it was.

Diagram showing text crossed out and then marked with a dotted underline and the word stet to indicate that it should remain. — 01
**The stet proofreading mark**
A deletion is canceled with the word stet and a dotted underline: the original text is allowed to stand.

Stet comes from Latin and literally means “let it stand.” A proofreader uses it to cancel a change that has already been marked: traditionally, stet is written in the margin and a row of dots is placed beneath the affected text. The word or passage that appeared destined for deletion is to remain after all.

GEOGRAPHY OF THE POEM

The U Street Corridor

The brunch scene belongs to the social world of the U Street corridor in Northwest Washington, D.C.

This map locates the broader neighborhood rather than claiming one exact venue. It places the poem’s fleeting exchange of looks among the streets, restaurants, and gathering places surrounding U Street NW.

READER DISCUSSION

Share some words about these words.

Share a response to the poem. Comments appear after moderation.

No comments have been published yet. You can be the first reader to respond.