An Affirmation

Charles Bernstein

1997

I am not I
when called to account—
plaster over, dumbly benched
the corrosive ardency
of blinkered identification.
To affirm nothing, a veil
of asymptotic bent,
prattling over-
tunes in the striated
ecstasy of an turned-
around spade. Sprain parkway
gulls its titular
horizon, & my growling
Zebra knows me just
enough to tip
her hat.
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Creator Bio

Charles Bernstein

b. 1950

Poet Charles Bernstein grew up in New York City. He is a professor of English and comparative literature at the University of Pennsylvania, and is also an essayist, editor, translator, and librettist. Bernstein has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the New York Foundation for the Arts, and the National Endowment for the Arts. In 2006, he was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

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