AGNI 65
Contents
Editor's Note
The Thinker in the Garden
Fictions
The Man Who Knew Beckett
by David Gates
Search Party
Mendoza-Burke’s Reform
from The Widening
by Carol Moldaw
Split Up on a Dark Sad Night, Agreeing It Was Best
Poetry
Suite pour les amours perdus
Version of the Stalin Epigram
House and Highway
While an Old Clock Rang the Hour
Plywood
Smoke
A Wood Thrush
Barnegat Light
from Hallelujah Blackout
by Alex Lemon
Diamond
Waking
Lyle: Concentration
I Keep Imagining Mahler
In the Air
Goats, or Something
Oil-Soaked Scoters
At the Pool
by Tom Sleigh
A Page from the Nightbook
Translated from Swedish by Michael McGriff and Mikaela Grassl
In the Kingdom of Insecurity
Translated from Swedish by Michael McGriff and Mikaela Grassl
Landscape with Suns
Translated from Swedish by Michael McGriff and Mikaela Grassl
Migraine
Art Feature
Painter's Dream
FULL STOP: A Conversation with Tom Burckhardt (interview)
by Alexi Worth
Vast spans, subtle scapes. Tom Burckhardt’s stunning art feature, its images ranging from American urban to the Arctics and Asias of the imagination, announces the range of this issue. Richard Tillinghast’s real-life Istanbul jostles Kenneth Wong’s fictional Rangoon and Tomas Tranströmer’s lyric Swedish meditations. David Gates’s voice-fugue channels Samuel Beckett, and Kim Addonizio moves the spirit of Chet Baker through her lines of longing and loss. Stories by Peter LaSalle, Edith Pearlman, Magdalena Tulli, Vince Passaro, and others. Poets include Stuart Dischell, Karl Kirchwey, and Debra Nystrom; essayists, Lia Purpura, Marie Mutsuki Mockett, and William Pierce.
Editor
Sven Birkerts
Sven Birkerts
Founding Editor
Askold Melnyczuk
Askold Melnyczuk
Senior Editor
William Pierce
William Pierce
Fiction Editors
William Giraldi
William Charles Delman
Jessica Keener
William Giraldi, William Charles Delman, Jessica Keener
Poetry Editors
Beth Woodcome
Rachel DeWoskin
Beth Woodcome, Rachel DeWoskin
Editor-at-large
Jennifer Stroup (Jennifer Alise Drew)
Jennifer Stroup (Jennifer Alise Drew)
Advisory Board
Leslie Epstein
Robert Pinsky
Derek Walcott
Rosanna Warren
Leslie Epstein, Robert Pinsky, Derek Walcott, Rosanna Warren
Editorial Assistants
Lindsay Guth
Ashley McHugh
Taylor Altman
Jacqueline Buddie
David Macey
Marianna Pease
Melanie Dahl
Kaelan Smith
Beth Romano
Tom Jungerberg
Anastasia Kolenda
Lindsay Guth, Ashley McHugh, Taylor Altman, Jacqueline Buddie, David Macey, Marianna Pease, Melanie Dahl, Kaelan Smith, Beth Romano, Tom Jungerberg, Anastasia Kolenda
Contributing Editors
Lucie Brock-Broido
John J. Clayton
William Corbett
Stuart Dischell
Sharon Dunn, ed. emerita
Thomas Sayers Ellis
Marie Howe
Diana Der-Hovanessian
Ha Jin
Alex Johnson
Susan Johnson
Fred Marchant
Fiona McCrae
Gail Mazur
Joe Osterhaus
Dzvinia Orlowsky
Liam Rector
George Scialabba
Tom Sleigh
Sue Standing
Oksana Zabuzhko
Lucie Brock-Broido, John J. Clayton, William Corbett, Stuart Dischell, Sharon Dunn, ed. emerita, Thomas Sayers Ellis, Marie Howe, Diana Der-Hovanessian, Ha Jin, Alex Johnson, Susan Johnson, Fred Marchant, Fiona McCrae, Gail Mazur, Joe Osterhaus, Dzvinia Orlowsky, Liam Rector, George Scialabba, Tom Sleigh, Sue Standing, Oksana Zabuzhko