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Just in time for Valentine's Day,
the Guardian in London has
reviewed and raved about
The Secret Language of Sleep.
And, for the rest of the week,
you can buy it for $5!

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Hitler Sestina.

BY PETER DAVIS

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 To begin with, if I refused to begin
 I wouldn't make it this far. The second line
 is important but not near as important as the fourth:
 Hitler, 
 which sticks out like a small island
 or the short wave of a line ocean. 

 The ocean 
 of the second stanza may begin
 with two words that signify what surrounds the island, 
 but by line 
 five, again, the word, Hitler, 
 the name coming from the fourth

 dimension. Did I mention how dimensions go forth
 endlessly? Probably not. The waves of the poetic ocean
 may seem to support, come line three, Hitler, 
 again, this time beginning
 to be less surprising, but lining
 this giant swimming pool, in which, I land

 a perfect cannonball, my disconnected island
 of flesh splashing froth, waves like fore-
 play rippling through the body. A line
 like this last one, for instance, might thicken the ocean
 of thought enough to slowly begin
 to build back towards that awful name again: Hitler. 

 It is like a hitter luring 
 in the infielder with the threat of a bunt. Is land-
 ing on that name shorthand for begging
 for attention? (For
 the true measurements of this particular ocean, 
 please wait in line.) 

 Of all of the pertinent lines in this poem, the following line, 
 Hitler, 
 is the most important. O, sure
 I could try to sell you the island 
 of something else, but on the fourth 
 night my guilt would overtake me. It would begin

 to crawl, begin to weave a line
 of spiders through my subatomic particles. For Hitler
 is the split lip of the poem, the skin island in the bone ocean. 

 

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