First
Death
by Donald
Justice
This is Michael Carey for Voices from the Prairie a weekly sampling from the rich soil of Iowa’s literary tradition. Today we hear from Donald Justice a Pulitzer Prize winning poet from Iowa City. We will be hearing the second and third parts of his three part poem entitled "First Death." It has to do with the experience of his grandmother’s death when he was a child in Florida. Although Mr. Justice’s words here are somber and deeply moving, his touch with language is always light and full of music.
from First Death
June 13, 1933
The morning sun rose up and stuck.
Sunflower strove with hollyhock.
I ran the worn path past the sty.
Nothing was hidden from God’s eye.
The barn door creaked. I walked among
Chaff and wrinkled cakes of dung.
In the dim light I read the dates
On the dusty license plates
Nailed to the wall as souvenirs.
I breathed the dust in of the years.
I circled the abandoned Ford
Before I tried the running board.
At the wheel I felt the heat
Press upwards through the springless seat.
And when I touched the silent horn,
Small mice scattered through the corn.
June 14, 1933
I remember the soprano
Fanning herself at the piano,
And the preacher looming large
Above me in his dark blue serge.
My shoes brought in a smell of clay
To mingle with the faint sachet
of flowers sweating in their vases.
A stranger showed us to our places.
The stiff fan stirred in mother’s hand.
Air moved, but only when she fanned.
I wondered how could all her grief
Be squeezed into one small handkerchief.
There was a buzzing on the sill.
It stopped, and everything was still.
We bowed our heads, we closed our eyes
to the mercy of the flies.
from "First Death" by Donald Justice as published in Selected
Poems by Atheneum Press.
For Voices from the Prairie and Humanities Iowa, this is Michael Carey hoping you continue to hear the music blooming all around you.
Biography
Donald Justice was born in Miami, Florida and has taught at a number of universities including Syracuse, the University of Florida and for many years at the University of Iowa, in Iowa City where he now lives in retirement with his wife Jean Ross. His first book The Summer Anniversaries, was the Lamont Poetry selection for 1959. It was followed by Night Light (1967), Departures (1973), and Selected Poems (1979) which was awarded the Pulitzer Prize, and The Sunset Maker (1987). In 1992 University Press of New England published A Donald Justice Reader and in 1995 Knopf brought out his New and Selected Poems. In 1998 Story Line Press published his book of essays Oblivion: On Writers and Writing. He was co-winner of the Bollingen prize in 1991. A distinguished member of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, Mr. Justice has received numerous grants in poetry from the Rockefeller Foundation, The Guggenheim Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Arts.