“The Idea of Land” by Jeremy Paden

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Broken TulipsDo whales beach themselves because
the idea of land is a gene memory
tucked away in every cell? Driven mad

by the scent of lavender and verbena,
do they swim up on land hoping to find
that sad garden? Are their songs a recitation

of the love suicide of their original pair,
who threw themselves into the sea
but rather than die, were changed by water?

Are their long migrations a search
for that cliff, that rocky shore?

–Jeremy Paden,
Broken Tulips (2013)
Accents Publishing

Jeremy Paden

Jeremy Dae Paden was born in Italy and raised in Central America and the Caribbean. He received his Ph.D. in Latin American literature from Emory. His poems have appeared in such places as the Atlanta Review, Beloit Poetry Journal, Cortland Review, Louisville Review, Naugatuck River Review, pluck! and Rattle, among other journals and anthologies. This is his first published collection of poems. He is an associate professor of Spanish and Latin American literature at Transylvania University in Lexington, Kentucky and a member of the Affrilachian Poets.

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