Etymologies

by Sonia Greenfield

A concertina, like an accordion, 
made music with air drawn 
through bellows. The squeeze box
wheezed Flight of the Bumblebee, 
buttons controlling each exhale 
so the sailor in his striped shirt 
could lean against the mast, pull 
a minor chord and hum 
something of the sea. 
                 Between the wars 
many played until concertina 
was unbellowed and skinned down 
to the wire like a word stripped 
of its better meaning. Each coil like 
an unsprung spring, soldiers made 
concertina themselves from barbed 
wire built-up into elaborate patterns 
like small symphonies, each razor 
a rest when their hands 
became bloodied. 
                  What tune 
their prisoners may have heard 
on the opposite side of the stacked 
helices where bees made lazy work 
of the meadow. A swarming 
sound like breathing.

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“I wrote ‘Etymologies’ to try and explore the way a word can be appropriated and have its meaning changed. A concertina was originally a musical instrument, but the word now conjures a kind of wire fencing associated with images of military stations and battle. The poem is meant to evoke, in tone, that change in meaning.” —Sonia Greenfield

Sonia Greenfield (she/they) is the author of two recent collections of poetry, All Possible Histories (Riot in Your Throat, December 2022) and Helen of Troy is High AF (Harbor Editions, January 2023). She is the author of Letdown (White Pine Press, 2020), American Parable (Autumn House, 2018) and Boy with a Halo at the Farmer's Market (Codhill Press, 2015). Her work has appeared in the 2018 and 2010 Best American Poetry, Southern Review, Willow Springs and elsewhere. She lives with her family in Minneapolis where she teaches at Normandale College, edits the Rise Up Review, and advocates for both neurodiversity and the decentering of the cis/het white hegemony. More at soniagreenfield.com.