Heart Sounds

You unbutton the top few buttons of your blouse. The doctor places a cold stethoscope against your chest. He listens in silence to your heart. He listens with the wrinkled brow of intense concentration. He listens for what soon seems to you an unusually long time. You start to wonder what it is he’s hearing. Banging pipes? Dripping icicles? Creaky doors? A meaningless mumble? Then you remember being short of breath just last week during the exertions of lovemaking. The doctor is frowning as he listens. Whoa, he finally says, there’s a lot going on in there.

Howie Good

What is the significance of this work to you?

The pieces are attempts to transmute difficult emotions and experiences into something more inhabitable.

What is the significance of the form you chose for this work?

Prose poetry is a liminal form. As such, there are fewer expectations about what can be expressed in it and how it can be expressed. I find that exhilarating.

What was your process for creating this work?

Each piece went through numerous drafts. Writing for me is essentially rewriting.

Howie Good's latest full-length poetry collection, Gun Metal Sky, is due in early 2021 from Thirty West Publishing.

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