Denise Duhamel across three issues
Denise Duhamel is an American poet known for combining formal invention with popular culture, sexuality, politics, autobiography, humor, and feminist inquiry. Her books include Kinky, Queen for a Day, Ka-Ching!, Blowout, Scald, and Second Story. She is a Distinguished University Professor at Florida International University.
Three appearances span Issues 12, 17, and 24. Issue 12 records “Canzone of a Shoe Salesgirl”; its poem text is absent from the surviving page. Issue 17 preserves “Möbius Strip: True or False,” whose physical instructions turn the poem itself into a loop. Issue 24 preserves “INDEX OF SOME OF WHAT SHE ATE,” where food, shame, nostalgia, appetite, illness, memory, and family history take the form of an index. Together these works show Duhamel’s sustained interest in inherited forms and the pressures of lived experience.
Möbius Strip: True or False
after Luc Etienne, a variation
I’m pretty
sure my mother was
a virgin. Now
the trend is to take
the doughy middle out
of the bagel and throw
it away. The trend used
to be–eat half. I’m
pretty sure my father
wasn’t. A woman
calls The Loveline to ask,
“Are laxatives safer than
throwing up?” When
I was a teenager, hoping
to wear four-panel jeans–
left front leg blue,
left back leg yellow (am I
the only one who remembers
these?) right front leg orange,
back front leg green–
I was already a size
fourteen. The Sears
catalogue sold those jeans,
but they only went up to 12.
Every size after 12 was
“chubbette.” If I had
lived I may still have been
a camp heroine, but fat like
my rival Elizabeth Taylor.
Who am I? I know
Dr. Dray was just trying
to save her life, but he
shouldn’t have said, “Bulimia
doesn’t help you lose weight.
All you lose are fluids.”
The caller knew he was
lying, and he lost all his
credibility. She started to
fade, “Uh huh, right, uh
huh…” My grandmother
(my father’s mother) cut
up the meat on his plate until
he was 32, until he married
my mother. A girl once
choked to death giving a guy
oral sex. Is this urban legend
or truth? He’s still not
very good with a knife–No
Americans are complains my
husband who expertly shaves
the salmon away from its gray
skin with his. My mother
used to say the Sears Catalogue
was my bible. I sat in front
of it for hours, turning the thick
slick pages. He rented porno
when I was away. I had a fit.
When I slammed the door he
didn’t run after me. The
card he sent said, “Do I have
a chance?” Oh marzipan,
who molded you into such
a beautiful flower, your hefty
sweetness glistening like
wet sand? Why did I hit
her? She was so little. One
year (1971?) you could see
the penis of a male model
in boxer shorts and all
the Sears catalogues that
hadn’t gone out to customers
had to be destroyed. The
girl at the poetry reading
said to me, “How can you
even write about that?” She
had gray bowls, lumpy
like oatmeal, under her
eyes. “I’ve been well
a long time now,” I said.
She said, “I just came out of
the hospital again. I’ve been
three times, nothing works.
I really need to talk to
you.” My best friend:
a.) had the penis-catalogue;
b.) only said she had the penis-
catalogue or c.) was jealous
because our family got
the penis catalogue
first. I am the son
of god, a carpenter, a shoe
salesman, a curse. I’m also
into fasting–can you guess
who I am? The mean
mother, the one who never
served cookies, who
demanded quiet, grabbed
a scrap of construction
paper from the floor under
the kitchen table and
screeched, “Who left this
here?” True or false:
everything is about sex except
sex which is about power
and money. Someone
pulled my arm to sit me at
a table to sign my books. “Wait
here,” I told the girl, and her
oatmeal eyes shot something
like hatred towards me,
a dim weakened hatred.
She waited by the door
and whenever I could I
tried to smile at her.
She was glaring at me, and
looking at her watch. I should
have excused myself, signed
fewer books. You can
also see a penis inside
the swirls of the camel fur
on a packet of Camel cigarettes.
At first the body just looks
like scrambled eggs, but stare
long enough and you’ll see
the penis. The truth
is I’m still not completely
well. When she
slammed the door I didn’t
run after her.
How to make the Möbius strip
For the complete “Möbius Strip” effect, print two copies of the poem. Tape the pages into two long pages, trim away the title and material below the final line, and place the copies back to back so that they run parallel in mirrored orientation. Loop the resulting strip into a cylinder, twist it once, and join the first and last lines. The reading can begin or end at any point.
INDEX OF SOME OF WHAT SHE ATE
The Issue 24 poem takes the shape of an index whose entries turn remembered foods into cross-references for nostalgia, shame, binging, anxiety, merriment, illness, family ritual, and survival. It begins with applesauce and Newport Creamery milkshakes, moves through bagels, breads, candies, hospital food, communion wafers, childhood snacks, diets, and near-death experiences, and ends with yams and Zarex syrup. Its alphabetical order creates a second autobiography out of appetite.
Selected surviving entries:
Applesauce, p. 12
Awful Awful milkshakes from Newport Creamery, p. 24 (See also INDEX OF NOSTALGIA)
Bacon, p. 14
B.L.T.’s, mother teaching her to say “hold the mayo,” p. 16
Bagels — cheese bagels, p. 67; egg bagels, p. 64; sourdough bagels p. 63 (See also INDEX OF BINGING and INDEX OF SHAME)
Carrot juice, palms orange from overdrinking, p. 111 (See also INDEX OF ANXIETY)
Chocolate — chocolate bars, chocolate chips, chocolate-covered cherries, Godiva, M&M’s, Whitman Sampler
Dirt, spoonful of, p. 2-3
French toast, p. 6, 74, 110 (See also INDEX OF NOSTALGIA)
Hospital food, p. 38, 104, 190-191
Host, the Catholic, p. 17, 39, 88-89, 106, 210
Jiffy Pop popcorn, bottom mostly burnt, p. 23-24 (See also INDEX OF NOSTALGIA)
Kool-aid — finished drink, p. 20; powdery crystals from the packet, p. 19
Pop Rocks, rumor of Mikie choking on, p. 12-13 (See also INDEX OF NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCES)
Space Food Sticks, “the energy food developed by Pillsbury under a government contract in support of the U.S. aerospace program—balanced nutrition, 44 calories,” p. xi
Wasabi, choking, mistaking it for guacamole, p. 131 (See also INDEX OF SHAME)
Yams — baked, p. 88; candied p. 22
Zarex syrup, with the zebra logo on the bottle — finished drink, p. 20; sweet undiluted syrup p. 19
Books and teaching
The Poetry Foundation, the Academy of American Poets, and Florida International University document Duhamel’s books, collaborations, awards, and teaching. Her career includes extensive collaboration with Maureen Seaton, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, and guest editorship of The Best American Poetry 2013.