{"id":123221,"date":"2018-03-21T19:26:22","date_gmt":"2018-03-21T23:26:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=123221"},"modified":"2018-03-21T19:34:25","modified_gmt":"2018-03-21T23:34:25","slug":"2018-whiting-awards-rickey-laurentiis-poetry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/03\/21\/2018-whiting-awards-rickey-laurentiis-poetry\/","title":{"rendered":"Rickey Laurentiis, Poetry"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Rickey Laurentiis, 2017.<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

Rickey Laurentiis, whose poems \u201ctrace the complex relationships among power, freedom, and violence with both sinuous lyricism and urgent declamation,\u201d was raised in New Orleans, Louisiana. He is the author of\u00a0Boy with Thorn<\/em>, which won the Cave Canem Poetry Prize and the Levis Reading Prize. His\u00a0work has appeared in\u00a0The New Republic,\u00a0<\/em>the\u00a0New York Ti<\/em>mes<\/em>,\u00a0Poetry<\/em>, and many other places.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

\u201cBoy with Thorn\u201d
\nUnknown, first century BC, bronze<\/p>\n

1.<\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Entered, those shadows spoke his loneliness
\nlike a god.<\/p>\n

2.<\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 This was new knowledge. The kind he had little
\nbusiness knowing. The mere
\nrisk of it making it
\nall the more delicious.\u00a0<\/p>\n

3.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0A forced-out confession. A forcing-it-in.<\/p>\n

4.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Each push, where the blood yawned like an opiate.
\nEach inch, a hermeneutics of the self.<\/p>\n

5.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Would you feed on such hurting, would you drink so much?<\/p>\n

6.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Was he so terrible a thing to look at?
\nBut was looked at.<\/p>\n

7.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0His face chiseled deliberate.
\nHis face, a question gone unanswered\u2014<\/p>\n

8.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0There could have been a thorn already inside? His tongue.
\nScratching its wrongs, speaking its six troubles.<\/p>\n

9.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0How?<\/p>\n

10.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0There could have been a thorn already inside? The point in his eye.
\nWhat makes the shadows their acutest when they lift and sprawl.<\/p>\n

11.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I keep thinking of the thorn as
\na marker, scrawler, what shapes the places both excused
\nand forbidden
\nin his body\u2019s swamp.<\/p>\n

12.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Violence thou shalt want. Violence thou shalt steal
\nand store inside.<\/p>\n

13.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This Spinario, Fedele, boy with
\na message, a mission; Pickaninny\u2014
\nWho would not stop for
\ndamage, the old story goes . . .<\/p>\n

14.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Shame, guilt, spleen, woe, shock, and want.<\/p>\n

15.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0He wanted them gone, I know: all his deeper hurts,
\npoorer gods, that lush resentment.<\/p>\n

16.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0But failed. They were greater dark, vials of
\nmystery, done things.<\/p>\n

17.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Take it. Don\u2019t you have to learn
\nto take it, eventually?<\/p>\n

18.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I told him the thorn was as a key,
\nhis body a lock.<\/p>\n

19.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I made him meet the key up with the lock. Turn.<\/p>\n

20.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I told him, Rickey, turn\u2014<\/p>\n

21.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0He did: an anti-chrysalis, a lyric,
\nwhich is the piece of a prayer visible.<\/p>\n

22.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Until he rewound: a new republic, a kingdom where not savagely
\nhe was king.<\/p>\n

23.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Who could bare the wind?<\/p>\n

24.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Who could feel the self demanding the self?<\/p>\n

25.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Who could see his honesty? His face more handsome
\nonce the pain combed
\nthrough, combed like a river
\ntoo clean for love.<\/p>\n

26.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Violence thou shalt want. Violence thou shalt steal
\nand store inside.<\/p>\n

27.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0He would devour it.<\/p>\n

28.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This was his body, his body
\nfinally his.<\/p>\n

29.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0He shut the thorn up in his foot, and told his foot
\nWalk.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Rickey Laurentiis, whose poems \u201ctrace the complex relationships among power, freedom, and violence with both sinuous lyricism and urgent declamation,\u201d was raised in New Orleans, Louisiana. He is the author of\u00a0Boy with Thorn, which won the Cave Canem Poetry Prize and the Levis Reading Prize. His\u00a0work has appeared in\u00a0The New Republic,\u00a0the\u00a0New York Times,\u00a0Poetry, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1442,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[33429],"tags":[33430,33443,33444,33021,2541,1447,165,33442,10662,27948,20510,21641],"class_list":["post-123221","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-whiting-awards-2018","tag-2018-whiting-awards","tag-boy-with-thorn","tag-cave-canem","tag-cave-canem-foundation","tag-new-orleans","tag-poet","tag-poetry","tag-rickey-laurentiis","tag-washington-university-in-saint-louis","tag-whiting-award","tag-whiting-foundation","tag-whiting-honorees"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n2018 Whiting Awards: Rickey Laurentiis, Poetry<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Read \u201cBoy with Thorn,\u201d a poem by Rickey Laurentiis, winner of a 2018 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