One is thunderstruck that such a brutal violation has occurred in what previously seemed a benevolent world.
-George Saunders, Lincoln in the Bardo
In our digital/AI age, in a year that has challenged relationships, the body politic, common sense, the United States' global standing, the American democratic experiment, in a year of incessant war and war mongering, there is solace in a creative spirit whose wisdom, gifts and judgment leads us to a quiet place of reflection and hope. Such are the joys of reading Steve Zeitlin's How Do You Wear the Universe; Poems and Essays 2002-2025 to be savored slowly and with intention.
Zeitlin is the founder of City Lore, trained as a folklorist, and well known in New York as one of the guardians of the city's cultural history and treasures. Born in Philadelphia, raised in Brazil to Jewish migrant parents, he's at ease in multi-ethnic urban diversity without complaint or judgment. But his self-doubts surface nonetheless, as for us all. The practice of writing 14 lines of poetry every morning, "to figure out who I am," began early, and continues to this day. "I almost dedicated the book to myself," he says with wry humor. Instead, he dedicated it to his two children, Ben and Eliza. "May they wear their universe snuggly," he writes to them, and for them.
As the co-owner of Mediacs Books, I was honored when Steve agreed to our publication of How Do We Wear The Universe. I wrote to him immediately:
"I just spent a pleasant afternoon reading your book. Your writing practice and process is so interesting, similar to mine. Your emotions are accessible in the poems, which I always appreciate, and also your life story surfaced so I got to know more about you and your family. Poetry as memoir and much else. (I was curious how your family ended up in Brazil.) The ruminations about time and mortality are ever present, challenging, but digestible as poetry, if digestible is the correct word, and it probably isn't. Such ruminations can be disturbing unless we allow our minds to fly off into the universe in art, no? So this is what poetry is for, I thought to myself as I read. The poems live on, as art and artifact, and we live on in them.
I have a few favorites: The poems about Eliza, the poem by Eliza.
The poems about Amanda and other loves in your life.
The Seder poem and other poems that reference your childhood.
The poems about finding poems in everyday life.
All the rhymed poems for some reason.
and more...
To combine essays and poetry in one volume worked well, I thought. The essay about your father-in-law is particularly special."
Why the 14 lines? I asked during a recent phone conversation with Steve. "Shorter than a sonnet, longer than a haiku," he explained. During poetry gatherings at City Lore of a poetry group he founded called Brevitas, Steve projects the poems onto a wall so that the audience can also view them. "Reading poetry is also a visual experience," he says. He'll be gathering poets together again at City Lore to celebrate the 250th birthday of the United States of America and reading from How Do You Wear the Universe at Barnes & Noble, Union Square, in New York City at 6 pm on Thursday, April 9th. Steve will be in discussion with my husband, MediacsBooks President, Jim Bergman, followed by an audience Q&A and signing line. This event is free & open to the public.