Every Ravening Thing

Author of two previous collections of poetry: BLACK HOPE (1997) and ANTIDOTE FOR NIGHT (2015). de la O is also the publisher of the journal ASKEW.

Keats at Fourteen
She dozes, her nails fretted against the linen’s border,
a hectic rose flaming each cheek. Her lips move, no words.
The boy is guardian spirit, no one but he enters this sickroom
where his mother fades, home finally after six years—failures,
disgrace. Scarlet daughter, neighbors hiss, slave to appetite,
but John is single-minded—she will live. No one but he gives her
the tincture of mercury—one tenth of a grain daily, dabs the sweat
of her fevers away, a basket of withered poppies at his feet. He pierces
each capsule with a needle, drops it in a small glazed crock to warm
near the stove, sweat out the opium. Then he’ll add wine, saffron,
nutmeg. It takes time, the hour darkens. He cups his hand
to light the votive. She moans a furred voice from webbed lungs,
a cup of black blood brimming, the pilgrim is fleeing the City,
he leans in closer, the City of Destruction, takes her clammy hand,
that place also where he was born, so close now he’s breathing her,
“Johnny,” she cries, “lift me up, Johnny, your father is here in the room.

More Praise

Every Ravening Thing presents a matchless intensity and intellectual grit, a fearless investigation into the world amplified by a vision that is both cosmic and detailed in our common suffering. This is a brave book of poetry.

Christopher Buckley

What is ferocious – ravenous – here is the poet’s driven need to tell things as they truly are, which means it’s not always a pretty picture that she so carefully assembles for the reader. And I love the raucous regard she has for diction: reckless and powerfully inventive and fresh the way air can be fresh. All of this is held together by a commitment to the music that drives these poems in a way that soothes the ear. Every Ravening Thing could serve as a warning to all of us about our failures as men and women, and as a celebration of the good we’re capable of doing and in that way is a necessary part of our reading.

Bruce Weigl

This is poetry meant to open hearts and change attitudes in fundamental and necessary ways, poetry of witness and utility. It is also often deeply moving.

South Florida Poetry Review

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