The title is a nude

Dear all,

welcome to my blog. It has been set up in response to the call for papers linked to this conference.

This website serves as a repository of ideas and inspirations I wish to feed into a paper entitled '“Your fingers were our cathedral”: the body in David Shapiro’s poetry.'

Lips cut open, a nude reaching for a telephone, with moist lips, with a dagger in the back, turning... My aim is to discuss in depth the (not so) rare representations of the body in the poetry of Joel Shapiro (1947-2024).

'The title is a nude' because it is there to attract the readers' attention, but at the same time 'the title is not a can opener'*, so it does not tell in full the intricate story that the poem conveys. Let us therefore dive deeper into the poetry.

If you would like to know more about the poet or his poetry, you may visit my other pages:

Talking poetry

Evolution of the poetic language of Shapiro

You will find there numerous links that will lead you further.

This present content including the five numbered pages in the right-hand menu was presented in Wrocław, Poland, on February 13, 2026.

Katarzyna Wywiał

You can write me at katarzyna.wywial@ugent.be 

*The quotes are taken from Shapiro's poem entitled 'The Lost Golf Ball'.