Eviction
Throw me out of myself, out of who I am,
where I am, with whom I am. Toss
me aside. This is a kind of homicide
killing my peace of mind, killing my
hearth and home. Try a night out, alone.
Try a field, a lot, a bridge, a curb
to live?
What does it take to live?
Who forgives the debt of life, the burden, the rent of our bodies, the price on our minds,
what of the yard of things?
What does it bring?--
possessions in the grass,
possessions out like trash.
Walter Holland is the author of three previous poetry collections: Circuit (Chelsea Station Editions, 2010), Transatlantic (Painted Leaf Press, 2001), and A Journal of the Plague Years: Poems 1979-1992 (Magic City Press, 1992). His novel, The March, was published in 1996 by Masquerade Books and a second revised edition was published by Chelsea Station Editions in 2011. His poems have appeared in many anthologies, most notably Poets for Life: Seventy-Six Poets Respond to AIDS in 1989, The Columbia Anthology of Gay Literature in 1989, Poetic Voices Without Borders in 2005, Stonewall's Legacy: A Poetry Anthology in 2019, and A Day Without Art: Special Anniversary Edition also in 2019. His dissertation “The Calamus Root: American Gay Male Poetry Since World War II” can be accessed online via the Graduate Center CUNY website and has been used as a research tool by scholars worldwide numerous times since 1998. Some of his recent poetry credits include: Exquisite Pandemic, HIV Here and Now, Cutbank, About Place, Mollyhouse, and A&U: America’s AIDS Magazine. His fourth book of poetry Reconstruction (2021) is available from Finishing Line Press. www.walterhollandwriter.com.
Throw me out of myself, out of who I am,
where I am, with whom I am. Toss
me aside. This is a kind of homicide
killing my peace of mind, killing my
hearth and home. Try a night out, alone.
Try a field, a lot, a bridge, a curb
to live?
What does it take to live?
Who forgives the debt of life, the burden, the rent of our bodies, the price on our minds,
what of the yard of things?
What does it bring?--
possessions in the grass,
possessions out like trash.
Walter Holland is the author of three previous poetry collections: Circuit (Chelsea Station Editions, 2010), Transatlantic (Painted Leaf Press, 2001), and A Journal of the Plague Years: Poems 1979-1992 (Magic City Press, 1992). His novel, The March, was published in 1996 by Masquerade Books and a second revised edition was published by Chelsea Station Editions in 2011. His poems have appeared in many anthologies, most notably Poets for Life: Seventy-Six Poets Respond to AIDS in 1989, The Columbia Anthology of Gay Literature in 1989, Poetic Voices Without Borders in 2005, Stonewall's Legacy: A Poetry Anthology in 2019, and A Day Without Art: Special Anniversary Edition also in 2019. His dissertation “The Calamus Root: American Gay Male Poetry Since World War II” can be accessed online via the Graduate Center CUNY website and has been used as a research tool by scholars worldwide numerous times since 1998. Some of his recent poetry credits include: Exquisite Pandemic, HIV Here and Now, Cutbank, About Place, Mollyhouse, and A&U: America’s AIDS Magazine. His fourth book of poetry Reconstruction (2021) is available from Finishing Line Press. www.walterhollandwriter.com.