Small Talk
Kathryn D. Temple | Poetry, Summer 2024
When someone asks about my family,
they’re just making conversation
so I like to keep it light—we put the fun
in dysfunctional, I’ll say. Or depending
on my mood, Oh, yes, we were raised
in a cult by narcissistic wolves, we’re
a regular pack of howler monkeys, most of us
are dead now, don’t worry but this animal
stuff only goes so far and everyone
loves a good story so if they persist, I’ll tell
them about Daphne, whose
father turned her into a tree instead
of letting her have a god for a boyfriend
and sooner or later if anyone’s still
asking, I’ll bring up Odysseus
and Penelope, her lonely labor weaving
every night, tearing it out in the morning,
just like a housewife who waits for her
husband to stop his philandering and
help with the children before they’re
lost to drugs, oh, I know what goes on with
wolves, men, gods. Children don’t have
a chance, not then, not now, why am I
at this party you sit on that sylvan sofa
in your oh-so-discreet silken suit, leave
the kids with Medusa—don’t you know
they’ve all turned to stone under her gaze
while you fly first class? When I look
around this room, I see flying harpies,
here comes a Cyclops, I tear out that eye
and hold it in my hand while he screams
or is that me, I tend to go too far
so I make up something about Persephone
and how she needed to return to the seventh
circle of hell, but that’s Dante, right? In any case,
it’s time to go home and if we leave feeling
dazed and wondering what just happened,
well, next time, don’t ask about my family,
ask me if I have plans for the summer
and I’ll tell you about my coming trip
to Athens, how much I love the language,
and the art, and how the people there
welcome me, the history so complex, if you get out
of town you can still hear wolves howl in the dark.
______________________
what my sister did
Kathryn D. Temple | Poetry, Summer 2024
I remember that day she threw her shoes in the river
and stood on the bridge to watch them bob away
with the current, their laces streaming, delighted
tongues lapped the water, liberated, they were
free of her and she of them, her feet, I mean, were
free to feel the warm boards of the old bridge
beneath them, to sense the tree in the boards,
her toes to curl around its whorls and worm holes,
then freely they thrilled to the grit of gravel,
to each cool blade of grass in the lawn,
their soles drank in the blue gray of fieldstone,
the sharp silver quartz, a sandy ant hill,
they alerted to the sting of a fire ant guarding
that hill and flushed pink pleasure on plush
carpets of moss, her feet had
never felt so alive, they grew eyes,
that led her in new directions, through them
she became connected to the earth, one
day she stood so still in a tilled field that her toes
began to grow and take root in the soil,
became long tendrils curling around rocks
and pebbles, going deep, past sleeping moles
and admiring aphids, all astounded by how quickly
roots yield a trunk, and it was true,
a sense of tree ensued, and she raised her arms
like branches and was pleased to see leaves
sprout from her fingers, newly green, glistening
but then maturing so quickly as new
growth came. And now, look at her, flowering,
a signpost for strangers, we tell them, turn
right after the sweet bay laurel, and she smiles
her tree smile, her secret satisfaction.
________________________________________________________________________
Why is this piece your Trace Fossil?
“Both poems speak to my experiences growing up in a tense and unstable family, but also to the ageless power of Greek and Roman myths to organize those experiences, so a trace fossil from my own past and a second one from the deep past. I think "what my sister did" is related to the awe in which I hold my sister's insistence on independence but also to the desire for both of us to find roots, or at least waypoints where we can be both free and safe simultaneously. (I wouldn't really want my sister to turn into a tree although she did announce one summer that she wouldn't be wearing shoes again until the start of school—and she stuck with it). I started “Small Talk” with the simple intention of critiquing “small talk” (I'm not very good at it). What emerged was a "trace fossil" describing a life that I left behind many years ago.”
Kathryn D. Temple has taught at Georgetown University for almost thirty years but only began writing poetry during the pandemic. Her latest work has appeared in Streetlight, Metaworker, Delmarva Review, and 3elements, among others. She has published two academic books on law and emotions and many essays in academic journals. Find her on the Chesapeake Bay or at https://georgetown.academia.edu/KathrynTemple and https://medium.com/@templek
Small Talk
Kathryn D. Temple | Poetry, Summer 2024
When someone asks about my family,
they’re just making conversation
so I like to keep it light—we put the fun
in dysfunctional, I’ll say. Or depending
on my mood, Oh, yes, we were raised
in a cult by narcissistic wolves, we’re
a regular pack of howler monkeys, most of us
are dead now, don’t worry but this animal
stuff only goes so far and everyone
loves a good story so if they persist, I’ll tell
them about Daphne, whose
father turned her into a tree instead
of letting her have a god for a boyfriend
and sooner or later if anyone’s still
asking, I’ll bring up Odysseus
and Penelope, her lonely labor weaving
every night, tearing it out in the morning,
just like a housewife who waits for her
husband to stop his philandering and
help with the children before they’re
lost to drugs, oh, I know what goes on with
wolves, men, gods. Children don’t have
a chance, not then, not now, why am I
at this party you sit on that sylvan sofa
in your oh-so-discreet silken suit, leave
the kids with Medusa—don’t you know
they’ve all turned to stone under her gaze
while you fly first class? When I look
around this room, I see flying harpies,
here comes a Cyclops, I tear out that eye
and hold it in my hand while he screams
or is that me, I tend to go too far
so I make up something about Persephone
and how she needed to return to the seventh
circle of hell, but that’s Dante, right? In any case,
it’s time to go home and if we leave feeling
dazed and wondering what just happened,
well, next time, don’t ask about my family,
ask me if I have plans for the summer
and I’ll tell you about my coming trip
to Athens, how much I love the language,
and the art, and how the people there
welcome me, the history so complex, if you get out
of town you can still hear wolves howl in the dark.
______________________
what my sister did
Kathryn D. Temple | Poetry, Summer 2024
I remember that day she threw her shoes in the river
and stood on the bridge to watch them bob away
with the current, their laces streaming, delighted
tongues lapped the water, liberated, they were
free of her and she of them, her feet, I mean, were
free to feel the warm boards of the old bridge
beneath them, to sense the tree in the boards,
her toes to curl around its whorls and worm holes,
then freely they thrilled to the grit of gravel,
to each cool blade of grass in the lawn,
their soles drank in the blue gray of fieldstone,
the sharp silver quartz, a sandy ant hill,
they alerted to the sting of a fire ant guarding
that hill and flushed pink pleasure on plush
carpets of moss, her feet had
never felt so alive, they grew eyes,
that led her in new directions, through them
she became connected to the earth, one
day she stood so still in a tilled field that her toes
began to grow and take root in the soil,
became long tendrils curling around rocks
and pebbles, going deep, past sleeping moles
and admiring aphids, all astounded by how quickly
roots yield a trunk, and it was true,
a sense of tree ensued, and she raised her arms
like branches and was pleased to see leaves
sprout from her fingers, newly green, glistening
but then maturing so quickly as new
growth came. And now, look at her, flowering,
a signpost for strangers, we tell them, turn
right after the sweet bay laurel, and she smiles
her tree smile, her secret satisfaction.
___________________________________________
Why is this piece your Trace Fossil?
“Both poems speak to my experiences growing up in a tense and unstable family, but also to the ageless power of Greek and Roman myths to organize those experiences, so a trace fossil from my own past and a second one from the deep past. I think "what my sister did" is related to the awe in which I hold my sister's insistence on independence but also to the desire for both of us to find roots, or at least waypoints where we can be both free and safe simultaneously. (I wouldn't really want my sister to turn into a tree although she did announce one summer that she wouldn't be wearing shoes again until the start of school—and she stuck with it). I started “Small Talk” with the simple intention of critiquing “small talk” (I'm not very good at it). What emerged was a "trace fossil" describing a life that I left behind many years ago.”
Kathryn D. Temple has taught at Georgetown University for almost thirty years but only began writing poetry during the pandemic. Her latest work has appeared in Streetlight, Metaworker, Delmarva Review, and 3elements, among others. She has published two academic books on law and emotions and many essays in academic journals. Find her on the Chesapeake Bay or at https://georgetown.academia.edu/KathrynTemple and https://medium.com/@templek