Tag Archives: barbara goldberg

2015—The Authors

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Barbara Headshot 2Barbara Goldberg is the author of four prize-winning books of poetry, including The Royal Baker’s Daughter, winner of the Felix Pollak Poetry Award. She is the translator of Scorched by the Sun, poems by the Israeli poet Moshe Dor. The two selected and translated four anthologies of contemporary Israeli poetry. Goldberg received two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts as well as awards in translation, fiction and speechwriting. Her poems appear in Best American Poetry, Paris Review, Poetry and elsewhere, Goldberg is the series editor of the Word Works’ International Imprint.

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“The Blood of a King” by Barbara Goldberg

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kingdom-of-speculation-thumbOnce there was a certain King who pricked
his thumb on the thorn of a white rose.
Even the blood of a King runs scarlet, and did.

It ran and ran. It ran until all the rivers
and streams in the kingdom ran red. Then
the fields turned red and everything that grew

in them, corn, barley, soon the milk from the cows
and goats. And when the Princess wept for her father
her tears ran red. And then he died. He was buried

without pomp in the red earth, leaving
the kingdom in disarray—the Queen
took to muscatel and her royal bed, attended

by seven simpering knaves. The Minister of Finance
retired to the counting house to count up the money.
There was plenty. He issued an edict forthwith

forbidding the pleasures of hunting, dancing, racing
and conversing, then galloped by horseback out
of the kingdom, followed by a pack of 42 mules

hauling coffers of sovereigns. And thus
the wealth of the kingdom was carted away.
The kingdom languished under a shroud

of thirst. But over time a particular flower
thrived, which the Princess, a botanist, named
amaranthus caudatus, love-lies-bleeding.

-Barbara Goldberg,
Kingdom of Speculation
(Accents Publishing)

Barbara Headshot 2Barbara Goldberg is the author of four prize-winning books of poetry, including The Royal Baker’s Daughter, winner of the Felix Pollak Poetry Award. She is the translator of Scorched by the Sun, poems by the Israeli poet Moshe Dor. The two selected and translated four anthologies of contemporary Israeli poetry. Goldberg received two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts as well as awards in translation, fiction and speechwriting. Her poems appear in Best American Poetry, Paris Review, Poetry and elsewhere, Goldberg is the series editor of the Word Works’ International Imprint.

“Kingdom of Speculation” by Barbara Goldberg

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Kingdom of SpeculationEggs coddled or poached are the food
of choice in the Kingdom of Speculation

for eggs are exceedingly rare and stored
in brooders. Brooders are guarded by men

who sport checkered vests and twirl
batons. To steal an egg is to be beaten

to death and the graves of thieves
are stacked like dominoes at the edge

of town. The rich feast on eggs
while the poor eat dumplings which look

like eggs but sink in the belly. Chickens
are revered, the most popular tunes

being hymns composed in their honor.
In this Kingdom only the weather is fair

and the air holds the scent of cardamom.
Overhead birds fly ignored, singing

an ostinato: what if, what if, what if.

-Barbara Goldberg,
Kingdom of Speculation
(Accents Publishing)

Barbara Headshot 2Barbara Goldberg is the author of four prize-winning books of poetry, including The Royal Baker’s Daughter, winner of the Felix Pollak Poetry Award. She is the translator of Scorched by the Sun, poems by the Israeli poet Moshe Dor. The two selected and translated four anthologies of contemporary Israeli poetry. Goldberg received two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts as well as awards in translation, fiction and speechwriting. Her poems appear in Best American Poetry, Paris Review, Poetry and elsewhere, Goldberg is the series editor of the Word Works’ International Imprint.

“Three Caskets” by Barbara Goldberg

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Kingdom of Speculation

Along came three suitors. She found them
all lacking: casket of silver, casket of gold,
casket of lead. She considers lead—

he’s heavy. If she ties herself to him
she’ll sink. But oh the liquefaction
of the sheets, and oh wouldn’t she expire

in the rapture of that deep. Silver
flashes slick off the tundra, elusive
as flight. In his wake, a killing

freeze, an excess of courtesy. At first
gold’s glitter dazzles, his overflowing
pockets. Fortuna is his mother, but

his expression’s a trifle stupid. How’s
a princess to rule with no casket
for her jewels? At this hour the shops

are closed. The graveyard beckons
but the coffins are sealed with old
remains. She’s been here before,

her legacy these ruby scars, those
smoky pearls. Let her string them
on a flaxen thread for all to see.

Let them incite the mercy of thieves.
Let her step forth in the ancestral land
accompanied by her own two hands.

-Barbara Goldberg,
Kingdom of Speculation
(Accents Publishing)

Barbara Headshot 2Barbara Goldberg is the author of four prize-winning books of poetry, including The Royal Baker’s Daughter, winner of the Felix Pollak Poetry Award. She is the translator ofScorched by the Sun, poems by the Israeli poet Moshe Dor. The two selected and translated four anthologies of contemporary Israeli poetry. Goldberg received two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts as well as awards in translation, fiction and speechwriting. Her poems appear in Best American Poetry, Paris Review, Poetry and elsewhere, Goldberg is the series editor of the Word Works’ International Imprint.

Kingdom of Speculation: Interview with Barbara Goldberg

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Barbara Headshot 2James Pfeiffer: This collection presents a new world to its reader—one that may be inhabited by some seemingly familiar characters, but which is governed by its own unique set of rules. (Where else are eggs kept under lock, key, and the protection of armed guards?) And the characters themselves are involved in a bit of world-building, and seem to take delight in it—I’m thinking of the Princess classifying plants throughout the kingdom, finding herself caught up in the “elation of naming.” I wonder if you found yourself in a similar state of elation as you defined your world. Are there pleasures in world-building as a writer? And how would you describe the pleasures of encountering world as a reader?

Barbara Goldberg: I love traveling to new worlds—especially from the safety of my own chair. That’s also reflected in my reading preferences: from A Child’s Garden of Verse (I especially liked the wrought iron gates and the woodsy green landscape beyond); to Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities (the more fabulous his cities, the more stringent the rules); to Julio Cortazar, who makes the ordinary magical—forks, spoons, watches, all with lives of their own. I am very attracted to magic realism and world literature that open possibilities not bound by laws of nature. Continue reading →

Kingdom of Speculation by Barbara Goldberg

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kingdom front

Accents Publishing is proud to announce that Barbara Goldberg’s Kingdom of Speculation is now available from the Accents Store.

“In this book you will be under the spell of imagination that is truly impressive. But, more than that: you will fall in love with Barbara Goldberg’s syntax. The way her sentence works against her line-breaks, creating fireworks, is a fairy tale in and of itself. Her poems are magical, not because they contain princesses and ravens and thieves of eggs. They are magical because their music grabs us and won’t let us be. The secret to true music cannot be understood. It can only be applauded.”

—Ilya Kaminsky,
Author of Dancing in Odessa

Kingdom of Speculation is available from the Accents Store.

Barbara Headshot 2Barbara Goldberg is the author of four prize-winning books of poetry, including The Royal Baker’s Daughter, winner of the Felix Pollak Poetry Award. She is the translator of Scorched by the Sun, poems by the Israeli poet Moshe Dor. The two selected and translated four anthologies of contemporary Israeli poetry. Goldberg received two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts as well as awards in translation, fiction and speechwriting. Her poems appear in Best American Poetry, Paris Review, Poetry and elsewhere, Goldberg is the series editor of the Word Works’ International Imprint.