A Collaboration from Cory Hutchinson-Reuss and Giselle Simón
Posted on March 31, 2021
[convalescence/cohabitations]
the peonies spread their white tissues slowly
paperwhite paperwhite a bouquet of cells
thousands of nodes graph the maples
miniscule birds waiting to burst & fall
through austere geometries & machine noise
who is inside me & who is in the trees?
I’m part sutures & glue, part bracelets from childhood
braided friendship bracelets in black, aqua, & pink
threaded morning & evening the fledglings
fell from oaks & rafters we fed them with a dropper
now the sky pales & the maples
return someone to me as I sit in the driveway
a daughter runs through the woods
she draws out the trees’ avian natures
she chants the names, she catches the feathers
she must’ve glued one to my chest, I remember
a tiny egg nestled there like a burr
now a low relief, a plume, small, fading, tender
like a young one sealed in loneliness
but spring means the return of sensation & no excuses
the flowers chirp
show their white teeth to all the passing neighbors
Cory Hutchinson-Reuss is a poet whose recent work can be found in Slice, Zone 3, Crazyhorse, the Offing, Pangyrus, and the Missouri Review online. She holds a PhD in English from the University of Iowa. Originally from Arkansas, she currently lives in Iowa City, where she participates in the Writers’ Workshop at Oakdale Prison and serves on the Advisory Council for Iowa City Poetry, a nonprofit group that works to make poetry widely accessible to the local community. She is also a poetry reader for the Adroit Journal.
Giselle Simón is the Conservator at the University of Iowa Libraries. Her interest in books, prints and paper began at the Kansas City Art Institute, where she received a BFA in printmaking. She began working in book conservation in 1992, first at Northwestern University and then at the Newberry Library in Chicago. She has taught bookbinding and conservation classes at the Columbia College Chicago Center for the Book and Paper Arts and the University of Chicago’s Graham School. She is currently Adjunct Faculty at the University of Iowa Center for the Book and Co-Director of Paper and Book Intensive, a working sabbatical for book and paper artists.