Give the Lake a Moment to Speak About the Horses
by Carlie Hoffman
Welcome to SWWIM Every Day’s annual Miami Book Fair preview. These video poems are each read by a woman-identifying writer who is attending Miami Book Fair 2024. Enjoy this taste of poetry, sponsored by Miami Book Fair and SWWIM. We look forward to seeing you at the Fair!
Appearance at Miami Book Fair 2024: Carlie Hoffman, Sunday, 11/24/2024, 11:00 am, Room 8303
Transcript of poem
I have a heart. It is full
of horses. My mother’s
heart, the horses.
In the lake’s center,
rain breathes down.
Someone lies bedridden.
Someone’s brother
goes estranged. For years,
hooves steep in mud,
a mare’s bent knee.
Closure is the rain
dripping over blood-lined leaves
above our dream lake. No,
the water was never blue.
No, don’t catch
this heart. Sadness, too,
it carries. Which horse
do you carry?
That’s what you need to know.Carlie Hoffman is the author of the poetry collections One More World Like This World (Four Way Books, 2025); When There Was Light (Four Way Books, 2023), winner of the National Jewish Book Award; and This Alaska (Four Way Books, 2021), winner of the Northern California Publishers and Authors Gold Award in Poetry as well as a finalist for the Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Award. Hoffman is the translator from the German of both Selma Meerbaum-Eisinger’s Blütenlese [Harvest of Blossoms], forthcoming from World Poetry Books, and White Shadows: Anneliese Hager and the Camera-less Photograph (Atelier Éditions, 2024), and the poems of Rose Ausländer. Hoffman’s other honors include a 92NY "Discovery" / Boston Review Poetry Prize and a Poets & Writers Amy Award. Hoffman's work appears in POETRY Magazine, Academy of American Poets, The Slowdown, New England Review, Kenyon Review, Jewish Currents, and elsewhere. She is the founder and editor-in-chief of Small Orange Journal.
"Give the Lake a Moment to Speak About the Horses" from When There Was Light © 2023 by Carlie Hoffman. Appears with permission of Four Way Books. All rights reserved.
12/12 / Poetry Reading and Conversation with visiting poet-in-residence Nicole Cooley + local writer Caroline Cabrera / The Gallery at The Betsy-South Beach, Miami Beach, FL / Live and Live-Streamed on Instagram Live/Facebook Live at @swwimmiami / 7-8:30 pm EST / Free
Two workshops remain in our Workshop Series--SWWIM Lessons: From Prompt to Placement: “Navigating Your Manuscript with Alexandra Lytton Regalado – What I learned from reading for (and winning) the National Poetry Series” on 11/12 (register here) and “Surfing Submittable with Jen Karetnick – Keeping your head above water in the poetry submissions process” on 12/10 (register here). Price: $80/workshop. Time: 7:00–9:00 PM (EST). Where: Zoom.
Note: SWWIM Every Day is now accepting poetry translations for publication consideration. Please see swwim.org/submit for the full guidelines.
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