Through the heavy door to the kitchen
where he works, I watch his silhouette
knifing thin slices of ham
off the glassy arc through the center of the leg
where the meat purples before the bone.
Each slice should weigh like paper if cut right.
You should see through the fat to your hand.
Each morning, he wakes before me.
He rolls the blanket inches back
to watch me sleep while he gets dressed.
Taneum Bambrick is the author of Intimacies, Received (Copper Canyon Press, Sept 2022) and Vantage, which was selected by Sharon Olds for the 2019 American Poetry Review/Honickman first book award (APR 2019). Her chapbook, Reservoir, was selected by Ocean Vuong for the 2017 Yemassee Chapbook Prize. A graduate of the University of Arizona’s MFA program, she is the winner of an Academy of American Poets University Prize, an Environmental Writing Fellowship from the Vermont Studio Arts Center, and the 2018 BOOTH Nonfiction Contest. Her essay, “Sturgeon,” was named a notable essay of 2019. Her poems and essays appear or are forthcoming in The Nation, The New Yorker, The American Poetry Review, PEN, and elsewhere. She has received a fellowship from the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and scholarships from the Bread Loaf Writers’ and Environmental Writers’ Conferences. A 2020 Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, she is a Dornsife Fellow in Creative Writing and Literature at the University of Southern California, and Co-Book Reviews Editor for Pleiades Magazine.
This poem appears in Intimacies, Received (Copper Canyon Press, 2022). The author grants permission.
Taneum Bambrick’s latest book is Intimacies, Received. Visit with her and her work at the Miami Book Fair 2022. Cover art by: Laura Burke, Strawberry Bed, 2017.
Welcome to SWWIM Every Day’s preview coverage of Miami Book Fair (MBF) 2021! The poets whose work you’ll be reading every weekday from October 25 through November 12 are just a few of the many authors from around the world participating in this year’s MBF, the nation’s largest gathering of writers and readers of all ages. They all look forward to sharing their work, thoughts, and ideas both in person and online. Between November 14 and November 21, new poet conversations and readings will be launched and available for free on miamibookfaironline.com (in addition to other content). For more information, visit the website and follow MBF on Instagram and Twitter at @miamibookfair and use the hashtag #miamibookfair2021.