“What is all this juice and all this joy?”
--Gerard Manley Hopkins
Novelist, memoirist, and poet, JOSEPH DI PRISCO published his fourth book of poetry, My Last Resume: New & Collected Poems in 2023. His work has appeared in numerous journals and periodicals, and his poetry has been awarded prizes from Poetry Northwest, Bear Star Press, and Bread Loaf. / Joe champions writers, artists, educators, and students through his decades of teaching and his involvement with organizations dedicated to the arts, theater, and children’s mental health.
Joseph joins us remotely via Zoom.
Welcome to the Poets Weave. I'm Romayne Rubinas Dorsey. Joseph, what poems have you brought for us today?
MY LAST RESUME
When I was a troubadour
When I was an astronaut
When I was a pirate
You should have seen my closet
You would have loved my shoes.
Kindly consider my application
Even though your position is filled.
This is my stash of snow globes
This is my favorite whip
This is a picture of me with a macaw
This is a song I almost could sing.
When I was a freight train
When I was a satellite
When I was a campfire
You should have seen the starburst
You should have tasted my tomato.
I feel sorry for you I’m unqualified
This is my finest tube of toothpaste
This is when I rode like the raj on a yak
This is the gasoline this is the match.
When I was Hegel’s dialectic
When I was something Rothko forgot
When I was moonlight paving the street
You should have seen the roiling shore
You should have heard the swarm of bees.
MY MISSION STATEMENT
“To bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world.” Nike Mission Statement
My mission is to be a unique driving experience.
My mission is to be putty in your hands.
My mission is to be your favorite pair of jeans.
My mission is to whisper in your ear in
Several pre-selected Romance languages. To star
In a movie that takes Sundance by storm.
(I hope Penelope Cruz will be in it
Even though she will contractually throw pans
Of ink on my head and shoot me colorfully
With a sleepy pistol and make her lips do that
Pouty thing upon which we can hang
The Collected Works of Henry James.)
Which reminds me. My mission is
To rewrite the dull parts of the Kama Sutra.
Because, listen, people! What’s a man without a dream?
I say he’s calamari soup. I say he’s a man without
A mission statement. This is why my mission
Is to be a global partner and a preferred
Provider. To serve nutritious food to
A hungry world. To leave it all on the field,
To go hard when coach calls my number.
My mission is to write one thing you must
Slip under your pillow. My mission is:
Be the pillow. My mission is: Be the night.
My mission is to bring inspiration and innovation
To each recluse in town, to every space
Station captain, to all radio listeners too shy
To call in, to even the stranger who left a nice note
On my windshield that time. You know who you are.
My mission is, be in business forever.
You've been listening to the poems of Joseph Di Prisco on the Poets Weave. I'm Romayne Rubinas Dorsey.
