Sleeping Lessons, a chapbook by J. I. Kleinberg
SLEEPING LESSONS: A POEM IN PARTS, J. I. Kleinberg. Milk & Cake Press, 2025.
If you find yourself awake in the night, fretting over political mayhem, have I got a book for you.
Twenty numbered parts. Twenty first lines: She taught me how to sleep –
A Dickinsonian cascade of variations on a theme.
Instructions for falling asleep: “string / the stars hung overhead,” “listen for the sea,” “name the gemstones / in the sky behind my lids,” “memorize a poem of breath / each molecule of air a wing / upon my tongue.”
Descriptions of a “she” who is part mother; part ghost; part earth, our home hung spinning in space: “her sweater pressed against / my cheek, the blanket satin / frayed by dreams.”
Kleinberg is also an artist (see her blog featuring her word art, chocolate is a verb). Each line is compressed, every word weighed and weighted, and the effect overall – hypnotic.
iv.
She taught me how to sleep –
explained that I could savor
slumber’s flavor as it settled
on my tongue, each grain
of sweet a recipe devised
by bees, who understand
the dance of flight, the taste
of work, the tidy hexagram
of night.– J. I. Kleinberg
Sleeping Lessons is a delight. Ideas for dreams, and maybe for your next chapbook on a theme.
You can find the book at Milk & Cake, and via either of Kleinberg’s websites, chocolate is a verb or The Poetry Department.