{"id":33701,"date":"2016-05-15T23:28:11","date_gmt":"2016-05-16T05:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/?p=33701"},"modified":"2018-09-06T02:11:29","modified_gmt":"2018-09-06T08:11:29","slug":"sunday-blog-read-janine-joseph","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/sunday-blog-read-janine-joseph\/","title":{"rendered":"READ LOCAL First: Janine Joseph"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"JJoseph-2b\"<\/a>SUNDAY BLOG READ\u00a0<\/strong>is your glimpse into the working minds and hearts of Utah\u2019s literary writers. Each month, 15 Bytes offers works-in-progress and \/ or recently published work by some of the state\u2019s most celebrated and promising writers of fiction, poetry, literary non-fiction and memoir.<\/p>\n

Today we are featuring Ogden-based poet Janine Joseph,<\/strong> who writes of being undocumented in the U.S.. Here she provides a sampling of the poems in her award-winning debut collection Driving Without a License<\/em> (Alice James Books, 2016).<\/p>\n

Born in the Philippines where she worked in TV commercials, Joseph and her family eventually came to California on a visa in the 1990s where they overstayed, eventually moving to Riverside, CA. \u00a0Her life experience gives her verse a “ferocious formal range and deep compassion,” according to Gabrielle Calvocoressi, and “an open and easy intimacy,” according to Chris Abani, both of whom have blurbed the back cover of her book. She currently teaches English at Weber State University.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Stephen Burt, writing in a Los Angeles Times<\/em> review<\/a> of the collection, writes that the Driving<\/em> “stands far apart from most first books, and from most books of autobiographical or narrative poetry, for the unpredictable vigor in its rhythmically irregular lines, especially in its depictions of youthful adventures.” \u00a0The poems, some linked-sonnets, have an immediacy that trundles through an alternative universe where one isn’t “legal” but where one still has to grow up.<\/div>\n

It is our pleasure to feature the works today of Janine Joseph. Enjoy!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

*<\/strong><\/p>\n

Wreck<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Janine, your head might have hit something in the car. Come to
\nand quickly. Opening your eyes might take hours. Janine, come to.<\/p>\n

When you undress and see the bruises, you\u2019ll torque your head again
\ninto the dash. But since you\u2019ll forget in the shower, Janine, come to.<\/p>\n

When you sleep I know it feels like your brain might be coasting out
\nthe window. I know it\u2019s an unfathomable horsepower, Janine. Come to.<\/p>\n

And your chest squeezes you when you breathe or think. When you
\nbreathe or think it\u2019s okay that you forget who you are, Janine. Come to.<\/p>\n

The doctor says touch your nose, count back from three, and repeat
\nafter me. Reel that sense back up your spinal tower. Janine, come to.<\/p>\n

When bent, bend. When pricked and injected with contrast, bite
\ndown on the scent in your mouth like skunk\u2019s sour. Janine, come to.<\/p>\n

Know if you take too long you\u2019ll lie wondering who said they\u2019d love
\nto hang, by the neck on the family tree, your mother. Janine, come to.<\/p>\n

Or worse.<\/p>\n

Think what else they might find in your body scanned blue and red
\non a screen while you lie docked, Janine. Come now. Come to.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

First appeared in\u00a0Hayden’s Ferry Review<\/em>\u00a048 and was\u00a0selected by D. A. Powell for inclusion in\u00a0Best New Poets 2011:\u00a0<\/em>50 Poems from Emerging Writers<\/em>.<\/p>\n

*<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Narrative<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

J gave me my first mop because she loved
\n          that I loved cleaning the kitchen instead
\nof pouring cereal over Saturday
\n          morning cartoons. J never felt the same,
\nand would lisp hours of Rascals <\/em>and Smurfs<\/em>,
\n          then Super Friends, Snorks<\/em>. But when J came to
\nget us, after we got the car and horse-
\n          property house, J and J never had
\nthe time\u2014too many chores with that yard and<\/p>\n

          all those fruit trees. J was wrong; I loved setting
\nthe table after mass with eggs and soy sauce
\n          the most, though I can\u2019t remember much of it,
\nexcept that J, J, and J were always there\u2014
\n          and I never got to see them anymore.
\nJ\u2019s permed hair was growing out and she and J
\n          started smoking without me. J was kicked out.
\nJ had even kissed a girl at the public
\n          school, and we knew what that meant. After he told<\/p>\n

the neighbor girl he loved her skull when he meant her
\n          soul<\/em>, we thought it was over for him and me, and
\nJ and J. J hung paper lanterns at Christmas.
\n          J still lined shoes at the door. J still stocked burlap
\nsacks of Calrose rice and bulk-boiled, still served and grubbed
\n          on pork with their hands. We were so new to the block.
\nSo when J laughed and made fun of J and the girl
\n          and how stuttering stupid he must\u2019ve sounded,
\nJ scolded us. We shouldn\u2019t talk about those things<\/p>\n

          or people who do those things, J said, and J listened.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

First appeared in\u00a0Lantern Review<\/em>\u00a0<\/em>4.<\/p>\n

*<\/strong><\/p>\n

Everything Signed and Filed<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Did you almost forget
\n          you were bitten by a spider
\nin that field where a two-liter bottle
\n          of 7 Up slowed and pointed
\nat you; that you pecked Jesse
\n          Ruby on the lips
\na week before sideswiping him
\n          with your sneakers; that you clapped
\nchalk dust behind the gym
\n          with the bad kids and learned
\nonly how to hock loogies;
\n          that you hunkered under your desk
\nduring a disaster drill and prayed
\n          for a bomb\u2014you laugh now,
\nbut you locked the garage door,
\n          packed your hand in the freezer
\nstocked with beef and berry Push-Ups,
\n          and didn\u2019t know if what made you
\nfinally cry was the bite, the boy calling you
\n          that name<\/em>, or the pound
\nof your fist down the hallway wall
\n          the same week you found
\nout you were different and couldn\u2019t tell
\n          anyone or scream what you were told
\neven Jesus wouldn\u2019t forgive<\/em>?<\/p>\n

First appeared in the Park Slope Reader <\/em>3.\u00a0It also appears online as a video\u00a0created by the Utah Division of Arts & Museums and\u00a0TWIG Media Lab for the 2015 Bite-Size Poetry project. You can watch the video here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

#<\/p>\n

Copyright by Janine Joseph, 2016<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Driving\"<\/a>Janine Joseph<\/strong> is the author of\u00a0Driving without a License <\/em>(Alice James Books, 2016), winner of the 2014 Kundiman Poetry Prize.\u00a0Her poems and essays have appeared in Kenyon Review Online<\/em>,\u00a0Best New Poets<\/em>, Best American Experimental Writing<\/em>, Z\u00f3calo Public Square<\/em>, the Academy of American Poets\u2019 Poem-a-Day series, and elsewhere. Her commissioned libretti for the Houston Grand Opera\/HGOco include What Wings They Were: The Case of Emeline<\/em>, \u201cOn This Muddy Water\u201d: Voices from the Houston Ship Channel<\/em>, and From My Mother’s Mother<\/em>. Learn more at www.janinejoseph.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Past featured writers in <\/em>15 Bytes\u2019 Sunday Blog Read<\/strong>:<\/strong>\u00a0Katharine Coles<\/a>, Michael McLane<\/a>, Darrell Spencer<\/a>,Larry Menlove<\/a>,Christopher Bigelow<\/a>, Shanan Ballam<\/a>,Steve Proskauer<\/a>, April Wilder<\/a>,Calvin Haul<\/a>, Lance Larsen<\/a>,Joel Long<\/a>,Lynn Kilpatrick<\/a>,Phyllis Barber<\/a>, David Hawkins<\/a>,Nancy Takacs<\/a>,Mike Dorrell<\/a>,Susan Elizabeth Howe<\/a>, Star Coulbrooke<\/a>, Brad Roghaar,<\/a>Jerry Vanleperen<\/a>,Maximilian Werner<\/a>, Markay Brown<\/a>, Natalie Young<\/a>, Michael Sowder<\/a>, andDanielle Beazer Dubrasky<\/a>,\u00a0Kevin Holdsworth<\/a>,\u00a0Jacqueline Osherow<\/a>, Stephen Carter<\/a>,\u00a0Alex Caldiero<\/a>,\u00a0Stephen Tuttle<\/a>, Raphael Dagold<\/a>, David Lee<\/a>,\u00a0Lisa Bickmore<\/a>,\u00a0<\/em>Kirstin Scott<\/a>,\u00a0Jesse Parent<\/a>,\u00a0Craig Dworkin<\/a>,\u00a0<\/em>Laura Stott<\/a>,\u00a0Jana Richman<\/a>, Melody Newey Johnson<\/a>, C. Wade Bentley<\/a>\u00a0and Amy Brunvand<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SUNDAY BLOG READ\u00a0is your glimpse into the working minds and hearts of Utah\u2019s literary writers. Each month, 15 Bytes offers works-in-progress and \/ or recently published work by some of the state\u2019s most celebrated and promising writers of fiction, poetry, literary non-fiction and memoir. Today we are featuring […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1566,"featured_media":33708,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_piecal_is_event":false,"_piecal_start_date":"","_piecal_end_date":"","_piecal_is_allday":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[69,35,2513],"tags":[2898,2897,1301],"class_list":["post-33701","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-bytes","category-literary-arts","category-read-local-first","tag-driving-without-a-license","tag-janine-joseph","tag-sunday-blog-read"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/JJoseph-2b.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-07-18 06:55:43","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33701","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1566"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33701"}],"version-history":[{"count":22,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33701\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35430,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33701\/revisions\/35430"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33708"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33701"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33701"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33701"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}