Connor and Jack discuss a poem by Andrés Cerpa whose book "The Vault" was recently long-listed for the 2021 National Book Award in Poetry. They dive into the short poem "The Nightmare Touched Its Forehead to My Lips" unpacking the ways it describes grief and loss, the meaning of vaults, and spend time on the title, which is also the title of a whole section of "The Vault."

Read the poem here (or below): https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/the-nightmare-touched-its-forehead-to-my-lips/

Learn more about Andrés Cerpa, here: https://www.andrescerpa.com/

The Nightmare Touched Its Forehead to My Lips
By: Andrés Cerpa

For the living, water. And now,
you’re all the wells mined for their depth.
All of the silence
& all of the alls I can conjure.
You are not in the living room.
You are not in your chair.
I drove to the end of the world today.
Snow in the forecast,
so I left my bicycle
& the other half of your ashes at home.

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Episode #142 The Nightmare Touched Its Forehead to My Lips - Andrés Cerpa

Close Talking is a poetry podcast hosted by good friends Connor Stratton and Jack Rossiter-Munley. In each episode the two read a poem and discuss at length. The pop culture references fly as freely as the literary theories. Close Talking is a poetry podcast anyone can enjoy.

Episode #142 The Nightmare Touched Its Forehead to My Lips - Andrés Cerpa

Close Talking: A Poetry Podcast