February 16 — Summary

Fanny HoweCheerful

The first word is, of course To Eat - manger, or The Manger, masticate and nourish, devour, rob-from-the-landscape, transform, sharpen the gums, or the teeth, fill the hole with parts of the world, stuff the anger, engender energy, manipulate fleshy objects, drain, suck, take away some of mum, milk is to eat what water is to bleed---mmmmmmm

The second word is

To sleep - Dormir, dormant, schlep, do-do, dip into silence, drown the brain, empty the wrists, multiply, rock in God, to fade away, to say goodbye world, to be smashed by space, ground under the wing of mercury, find Cinderella's shoe, to sleep is to stilskin, to threeblind -mice, to sleep is to do the no-no The third word is

To want - Desirer, voler, volley, decimate, wah!, Wampum, to lay hands up in greed and yearning, to claim with the brain, to see, to go yo-yo-yo-yo, to call aieeee when it's too late, to fall without wings is to want to fly, to be empty of, to lack and to grasp at, to miss (as in je me manque de toi-literally, I am missing, myself, of you.) The fourth word is

To kill - kullen, cool, keel, curl, call, cull, crack-on-the-skull, demolish, obliterate, to call yah-yah-yah-yah or ach! beautiful der killen beautifully, ugly der killen uglily, mad at mama, mad at dad, mad at someone who always had, do em in, do em out, der gotten wormies in der snout

The last word is

To love - lubere, amor, leaf, amiable, amazing grace, amazon and ammunition, lamb-of-the-pink side, la-la, to eat to sleep to want to kill to want to eat to sleep to kill to sleep to kill to want to eat to kill to eat to sleep to want to love equals to hug your luggage all the way to the country in a big blizzard to earn some bread to feed the one you is equal to

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Fanny Howe builds the poem as a list of five basic verbs: to eat, to sleep, to want, to kill, and to love. Each one gets a burst of word association. She slides between languages, nursery rhymes, baby noises and slang, so the verbs feel like things a child learns first, before grown-up meaning settles in. Eating becomes "milk is to eat what water is to bleed," while wanting is "to fall without wings."

The mood shifts as it goes. The early sections are playful and sing-song, but hunger, loss and anger keep pushing through, especially in the lines about being "mad at mama, mad at dad." Then love arrives, and the first four verbs get shuffled together, as if love is made of all of them and can't be separated from them.

The ending is the surprise. Instead of a definition full of big feeling, love is plain effort: hugging your luggage through a blizzard to earn bread and feed someone. The poem suggests love is something you do, and it costs you.

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