Reading “Crossing” by Jericho Brown

Poetry Lunch S2E2

Reading “Crossing” by Jericho Brown from The Tradition, published by Copper Canyon Press.

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A poem for you about water, and vastness, and movement. Each time I visit this poem I feel recognized in my cycles of work and it makes me pause and step back to wonder at the drive and dedication I approach most days with, without an articulated sense of where I’m going or why such the hard lean toward forward.

This poem leaves me always with a delicious free feeling, a breath-catching moment at the edge of that last word “leaps,” wondering after what leap may be next in store for me. And reminding me how exhortations and life-filling change can be.

Gratitude to Jericho for the beautiful poem and attention to language and humans living in it, and to Copper Canyon for making all kinds of leaps in their publishing throughout the years.

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Related prints

I made a broadside of this poem but also, lesser known, I made a 3x3ft linocut inspired by it too, for a steamroller printing event at Wayzgoose Kitsap. The theme was water, and of course I could not get Jericho’s poem out of my head. A lot of work for a few prints but quite gratifying. This is one of those projects I did in the midst of so much else I never really documented it nor told the story.

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Links to purchase

Get the book here: The Tradition and the print here: Crossing.