Daniel Simon
Winter 2026 | Poetry
Overheard
This was meant to be a story,
But perhaps you’ve heard it already.
If you stopped long enough
To listen, would you retell it
In your own words to another?
Or, maybe, sequester it within?
I’d borrow some handiwords
To begin with, then fashion them
In a certain arc of pleasure
Like the tensile arch of your
Back against my fingertips.
Syllables would cascade down in
Similitudes like the birdsong
That, finding the topmost branch
From which to descend,
Seeks a hearing:
In lengthening sunlight
You wait for the pattern to take
Shape in waves that crest and
Subside, pulse, pulse, and repeat,
Strike chords that – suspended
In the air – ring,
rimming around
And around the
circumference
of the telling.
An award-winning essayist, poet, and translator, Daniel Simon is editor in chief of World Literature Today magazine at the University of Oklahoma, where he also serves on the affiliate faculty in English, International Studies, and Judaic Studies. His third verse collection, Under a Gathering Sky, was published in 2024. His newest anthology, A Compass on the Navigable Sea: 100 Years of World Literature, is due out in February. His memberships include the Academy of American Poets, Nebraska Center for the Book, and the Norman Arts Council Roundtable.