Michael Teig

Michael Teig Poems

Michael Teig Biography

Michael Teig (born 1968), is an American poet and a founding editor of the American literary journal, jubilat. Born and raised in western Pennsylvania in the City of Franklin, Teig holds a bachelor's degree in English from Oberlin College and a master of fine arts degree in Creative Writing from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Teig attended the Kiski School in Saltsburg, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1888, this all-boys boarding school introduced him to arts. His first book, Big Back Yard (BOA Editions, 2003), was selected by Stephen Dobyns to receive the inaugural A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize. Teig's poems have appeared in periodicals including FIELD, The Black Warrior Review, Crazyhorse, The Ohio Review, and The Gettysburg Review. He is a founding editor of jubilat, a twice-yearly international poetry journal. Teig currently (as of late 2006) lives in Easthampton, Massachusetts, where he works as a freelance writer and editor.)

The Best Poem Of Michael Teig

Excluded From Frescoes

Thank you for the gift. Never have I seen
a more thoughtful tea-strainer.
For you I'm striking a silent movie pose.

For instance, I step out and take in the moon
like a tourist. It puts tiny gloves on the ferns.
It's bigger than life size.

I've a room here just for sitting. If I want
I fetch some music to slap me around. I've three other rooms-
in this way the house resembles a cow's stomach.

I have the feeling we'll be excluded from frescoes
despite the fitful way you loved me, Alice,
I'm confident we're finally on our own.

If I need to think of you and I do
I let telephone wires paraphrase the landscape
till there's just a city block, a sooty building,

you settled into a chair with your legs and hair up
and your face adjusting to that new weather
right after the TV's been turned off. Hello.

Just past the hill here is the truckstop
borealis. This is Barkeyville.
Maybe we could argue over ice cream.

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