Poetry Magazine
Ode to the Steam Box
The steam box is used for bending frames and planks in traditional boatbuilding.
With a match I became a man
who summoned diesel
from the yellow caverns
of a ten-gallon jug, called the flame
now hissing out the hose
at the small house of water, that
rusted drum from which travels
an excruciating wetness — this
is what makes the body
otherwise, what makes it
sing. To take that
which has decided on a shape,
and bend, without breaking,
the lengthening fibers. To give
the straight thing curve.
To make of the tree a song
grown long in a linseed skin,
the slick hot strake waiting
to become parcel
of the round world again.
Source: Poetry (January 2013).
Biography
Matthew Nienow is the recipient of a 2011 NEA Fellowship. His latest chapbook is The End of the Folded Map (Codhill Press, 2011).
Poems by Matthew Nienow
Poem Categorization
SUBJECT Activities, Indoor Activities, Arts & Sciences, Architecture & Design, Painting & Sculpture
Poetic Terms Couplet, Free Verse, Ode
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