Here at Black Lawrence Press we are celebrating National Poetry Month with a poem a day, featuring a total of 30 authors from our list. Today’s featured poet is Marcela Sulak, author of Immigrant.
The History of Brussels Sprouts
This vegetable evolved from primitive
non-heading Mediterranean kraut.
It wrapped its crinkly little leaves about
its winsome, blooming face, and left to live
a classic Bildungsroman. Adjusting mien
and flavor, traveling north and west, it came
upon the gates of Brussels, took the name
that welcomed it. Gentlemen and lean
courtesans took into their mouths its tight
green jackets, endlessly disrobing, sheets
of luminosity pressed close. And fleets
dispatched to newer worlds carried wide
and far its seed. Like any immigrant,
it put down roots before it could repent.
Marcela Sulak is the author of Immigrant, and the translator of three collections of poetry from Czech and French. She co-edits the forthcoming “Family Resemblance: An anthology and exploration of 8 hybrid literary genres,” and directs the Shaindy Rudoff Graduate Program in Creative Writing at Bar-Ilan University. She hosts a radio show on TLV 1 called “Israel in Translation” and edits the Ilanot Review.
