Manick, Cynthia 2023
Blue Hour Reading Series with Cynthia Manick and Courtney LeBlanc
Haymarket House
I try to quantify what we inherit—
dancers legs that know how to roam
but be church pious by morning,
the ability to fold shirts into a perfect square
or the street walk that says I’m a willing
dove but need no man or pierced jewelry.
– Cynthia Manick, “Is This Your Sky or Mine?”
Watch Cynthia Manick’s 2023 reading with Courtney LeBlanc at the Chicago Poetry Center:
Cynthia Manick begins at 37:43 minutes.
Yesterday my legs were propped
in stirrups as the gyno said you
should go on The Biggest Loser.
I heard cities at the skull base
stuttering over each other,
vine and vowels of your rolls
and the garden under your chin.
The implied real estate of—
don’t you want to be beautiful?
Unmade and remade?
– Cynthia Manick, “Dear Future Body (Keep Your Skin Thickk)”
Watch this interview clip with Cynthia Manick:
Listen to this playlist inspired by Cynthia Manick’s recent collection, “No Sweet Without Brine”:
