excerpt from untitled poem about a red box

by Sarah Rosenthal

Untitled poem about a red box is a book-length poem about a handcrafted red box the size of a jewelry or takeout box on view in a small, dark, gallery-like space. On the surface of the box are embroidered objects that resemble butterflies or flowers; a poem threads its way in between these decorations. The viewers (a we comprising the narrator and readers) are given to understand that the poem, mysteriously, both is on and is the box, and that the poem is about death. Hanging above the red box there appear to be a series of similar boxes in other colors.

After the opening pages, which map out the above parameters, the manuscript consists of a series of poems that appear on the lid, in each case followed by an exploration of the poem’s manifestation and meaning. Each poem, we are given to understand, may be the poem––or not. What follows is the first such poem (in italics) and the musing that results.

Do embroidered

letters loop:

Crowjay

promised food got

none      divebombs

yelloweyed grasps

ever loosening

index knuckle flesh

twists hard      you

clutch that small

heartracing

body      bash beak

shocked eyes

against bench

scuttle it limp

under leaves

all while

carrying on a

phone call with

the dead      mulch

scootched over

coldingfeathers

Are these

words stitched

in looping script

among butterfly-

petals or flower-

wings      are these

the words we

can’t or don’t

retain      having

traced each with

eyes      whispered

with lips teeth

and tongue

breath pressing

through moist

apparatus to

sound each

syllable      does

forget rhyme

with reject

Reject      do we

crowjay rage

flesh twist      torso

grip      beak bash

stun stare      dead

on phone      dead in

fist      scuttle

corpse

We thought desire

to connect      to

read and remember

wondered if beloved

rises for kiss      falls

back into deepest

slumber      leaving

the visitor bereft

we drank in color

studied materials and

craft      considered

relation of box to

poem      of cleave

and cleave

Yet this crowjay

poem is      we may

say      not the poem

or might not be

the poem      may

say it could

be      say is

but is only

thread stitched

by hand      whose

among shapes we

almost recognize

thread sewn on

an object displayed

under a single

gallery light

Might say it

is the poem or

could be so      if

so      what tidings

we might ask

does it bear

what that is new

and does new

mean the death

of all we know

does it mean

the other side of

time

Time to note we

may puzzle

prior to the poem

puzzle after      we

notice      it’s not

that nothing

has changed

This word bird

wrinkle      index

yellow shock this

dead call may

or may not be

the poem sewn

so or yet command

we attend      we

may consider it

gift      from whom

reciprocate with

questions

Must this violence

be received as

gift      recoil

knows no end      yet

we might wonder

at hunger      crowjay’s

anger      we

withheld food

Crowjay whose body

delivers missive

or just desserts

beak wrenches tribute

if not offered what

it needs it will

take

What does the

poem that may

be not the poem

the poem as gift

from whom

mean by hunger

food      crowjay

Does violence

rhyme with

chance      chance

with change

change with

all the while

carrying on a

phone call with

the dead

Might murdered

body scuttled

under mulch need

proper burial

But to bury

must we see this

colding broken

bird      these

yellow shock

eyes      staring

at us      still

But we knew

how      the poem

is about death

Is it we failed

to attend to looping

script      tried

not hard enough

to remember

tried to forget

Whose hunger

whose food

whose flesh

whose grip

whose promise

whose yellow eyed

stare      whose scuttle

under mulch      whose

phone      whose dead

on the line

Photo of Sarah Rosenthal

BIO: Sarah Rosenthal is the author of the full-length collections Estelle Meaning Star (Chax, 2024), Lizard (Chax, 2016), Manhatten (Spuyten Duyvil, 2009), and two books in collaboration with Valerie Witte: One Thing Follows Another: Experiments in Dance, Art, and Life Through the Lens of Simone Forti and Yvonne Rainer (Punctum, 2025) and The Grass Is Greener When the Sun Is Yellow (The Operating System, 2019), as well as several chapbooks. She edited A Community Writing Itself: Conversations with Vanguard Writers of the Bay Area (Dalkey Archive, 2010). Her collaborative film We Agree on the Sun has received numerous accolades including Best Experimental Short, Berlin Independent Film Festival. A new collaborative film, Lizard Song, is currently on the film festival circuit. She has received the Leo Litwak Fiction Award, a Creative Capacity Innovation Grant, a San Francisco Education Fund Grant, and residencies at This Will Take Time, Hambidge, New York Mills, Vermont Studio Center, Soul Mountain, and Ragdale, as well as a two-year term as Affiliate Artist at Headlands Center for the Arts. From 2012 to 2023, she served as a juror for the California Book Awards. More at sarahrosenthal.net.