Joanne Durham
Abstract Art
after “Daily News,” Painting by Kelley Carman
A woman, a chair, maybe even
a window. She is naked. Her thoughts
rise and waft past the curtains.
She is not rid of them—the thoughts—
the terrifying daily news—
but she practices letting them leave
her body. She doesn’t fool herself
that they’ve left the world.
It may not be a window, maybe not
even a room. My first look
at the painting: only orange, black,
blue blotches, a beige cloud rising
through them. It took time to see
the woman, to see by the strong
set of her spine how she knows
there’s work ahead, how she takes
the moment to settle.
Joanne Durham is the author of the poetry collection To Drink from a Wider Bowl (Evening Street Press, 2022), winner of the Sinclair Poetry Prize, and the chapbook On Shifting Shoals (Kelsay Books, 2023). A finalist for the 2025 Lascaux Prize in Poetry, her poem have appeared in Poetry South, Vox Populi, River Heron Review, Writers Resist, and other journals and anthologies. A retired teacher, Durham lives 50 feet from the ocean on the North Carolina coast.
Indolent Books and editor Michael Broder are back with another poem-a-day series as a creative response to the threat posed to our democracy by the current occupant of the White House. The plan is to continue for all 1460 days of the 47th American presidency.
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This is how I feel as a woman! You have captured a pain that does not leave!