Ben Lerner's books of poetry are The Lichtenberg Figures, Angle of Yaw, and Mean Free Path, all published by Copper Canyon Press. His novel, Leaving the Atocha Station, will be published by Coffee House Press this fall. He edits poetry for Critical Quarterly and teaches in the writing program at Brooklyn College.

Purchase his books here; check out his work in Typo, at the Poetry Society, and you can find the full text of the poem excerpted here in Jacket.

from Doppler Elegies

       VIII

the new construction going up
          is elegy, no
money down or interest through
The twilight of the medium
We’re heavily indebted to
interior scenes, now destroyed
          It says so here
On the computer, you can watch
          The seas

are rising, but
          But nothing
anywhere near waking
In the crawlspace, we prepared
brief, discontinuous remarks
designed to fall apart
          When read aloud
it reminds me of that time we saw
          silent films

accompanied by
          Her breathing was
a rustling of tenses, underground
Movements have become
citable in all their moments
With my non-dominant hand
          I want to give
in a minor key
          the broadest sense