{"id":1040,"date":"2016-03-04T20:11:28","date_gmt":"2016-03-05T01:11:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/?p=1040"},"modified":"2017-11-26T20:19:27","modified_gmt":"2017-11-27T01:19:27","slug":"amanda-cook","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/2016\/03\/04\/amanda-cook\/","title":{"rendered":"Amanda Cook’s ‘Fragments’ and ‘Gloucester Poem’"},"content":{"rendered":"

From \u201cFragments” by poet Amanda Cook (pictured above) of Gloucester, Mass., as published in late 2015 in the third issue of editor Joe Torra’s \u201cLet the Bucket Down: A Magazine of Boston Area Writing<\/a>“:<\/p>\n

I was seventeen or fifteen or sixteen I don\u2019t remember and I don\u2019t remember if I was upset because I couldn\u2019t figure out how to get out or because I was in the middle of getting out or because of everything that had happened but I was crying and it was morning and my mother came in and I needed her I needed her right then to tell me something to tell me it was alright and I was crying harder than I remembered crying I must have been fifteen because I cried harder when Galen died and I was crying so hard it was hard to breathe and my mother comes in and I say I need you and she looks at me crying she says get over it and leaves.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Below is Cook’s\u00a0“Gloucester Poem,” which she wrote around 1995, before her marriage, when she was known as Amanda Porter:<\/p>\n

Gloucester Poem<\/p>\n

1. Sacred Cod<\/p>\n

God made Gloucester
\nto fish.
\nNet regulations
\nare handed down
\nlike commandments
\nand are broken as easily.<\/p>\n

2. A Legend<\/p>\n

Howard Blackburn
\nrowed
\nuntil his fingers
\nfroze off.
\nModern day fishermen
\nsit in the
\nBlackburn Tavern
\nand drink
\nuntil their fingers
\nare numb.<\/p>\n

3. Statue<\/p>\n

\u201cTo they who go down
\nto sea in ships\u201d<\/p>\n

Olson (a foreigner)
\ndescribed
\nthe Man at the Wheel
\nas a god.<\/p>\n

He is just a man
\nat a wheel.
\nAnd there are lots
\nof men rolling bones
\nat the bottom
\nof the Atlantic.<\/p>\n

They take the cold
\nlike real men
\nand do not turn
\nseasick green.<\/p>\n

4. Sea Salt<\/p>\n

No prostitutes
\nin Gloucester.<\/p>\n

the women
\nare as starved
\nas men.<\/p>\n

They scratch and
\nclaw and
\ntie down
\nwhatever heat
\nthey can get
\ntheir hands on.<\/p>\n

5. Port<\/p>\n

Love
\nis
\npassed
\nthrough many hands–
\nit has been cut
\ntwice
\nby each (
\nleaving scars
\n) less potent
\nand less dangerous
\nthan the real
\nthing — heroin
\nis strong
\nand needles
\npiercing.<\/p>\n

6. Neighbors<\/p>\n

they fight
\ndownstairs
\nand on
\nthe street
\n\u201cwhy
\ndon\u2019t
\nyou
\nsuck
\nher
\ncunt.\u201d<\/p>\n

7. Connections<\/p>\n

my grandfather
\nthe first pediatrician
\non the island
\nhas saved many —
\nbrothers, daughters,
\nfriends —
\nand many enemies.<\/p>\n

8. Colony<\/p>\n

artists fester
\nin coffee shops and wharfs
\nsucking
\nthe real life
\nout of real people<\/p>\n

9. Lanesville<\/p>\n

Urksie
\na drunk Finn
\ndirects traffic
\nwith the authority
\nof a warrior
\nor walks
\nwith a lawn mower
\nand dog
\nlooking for jobs
\nto buy
\nfirewood.<\/p>\n

10. Our Ladies of Good Hope<\/p>\n

They sit still
\nwith candles lit
\nunder Saints
\nhanging
\nfrom the ceiling
\nwelcoming passersby
\nwith blaring records of Elvis
\nand homebaked goods
\npraying to Peter:
\nreturn our sons safe
\nfrom the Second World War.<\/p>\n

11. Memorial<\/p>\n

Each year
\nwe drop
\nflowers
\ninto the
\nwater
\nunder the
\ncut bridge
\nby the
\nbarren
\npedestal.
\nThe statue
\nfor the fishermen\u2019s
\nwives
\nhas
\nnever
\nbeen
\nerected.<\/p>\n

12. Ropes<\/p>\n

fishermen\u2019s hands
\nare sinews
\nknots
\nrope burns
\ndead skin<\/p>\n

13. Jail<\/p>\n

out the window
\nof the courthouse
\nyou can see
\nbeyond
\nthe breakwater<\/p>\n

14. Exodus<\/p>\n

Lane
\nStuart
\nHopper
\nHancock
\nSargeant<\/p>\n

didn\u2019t matter<\/p>\n

15. Census<\/p>\n

The roads
\nare paved
\nover cobblestones.
\nThe canons
\nat Stage Fort Park
\nstill protect
\nthe harbor.
\nOver a century
\nthe population
\nhas stayed
\nthe same.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From \u201cFragments” by poet Amanda Cook (pictured above) of Gloucester, Mass., as published in late 2015 in the third issue of editor Joe Torra’s \u201cLet the Bucket Down: A Magazine of Boston Area Writing“: I was seventeen or fifteen or sixteen I don\u2019t remember and I don\u2019t remember if I was upset because I couldn\u2019t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1042,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[107],"tags":[21],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1040"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1040"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1040\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4033,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1040\/revisions\/4033"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1042"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1040"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1040"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1040"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}