Distracted...

Distracted by the beauty that is poetry for this month, the headlines and events of these days continue, as though there was no poetry.

I still cannot forget. I'm angry. I've been angry since 2003. Looking back now, knowing the truth, I can see I should have been angry long before that.






The Black Prince


And in five days, FIVE DAYS
Your need for vengeance your
Bloodthirst brought forward the vision
No time for sadness
You seek power you have a dream
You met the press your
Banner raised and the following craft
You executed
Executed on
The American Taliban a sign
Of things to come and this
While we dug for the bodies in the shadow
Of the Statue of Liberty
Liberty – just a word to you and yours
Yoo denounce Geneva
And Gonzales called it quaint
The JAG jagged and Powell protesting
In February of 2002 your grand master
Buried Geneva with the bones of things to come and
Liberty wept
Ali Soufan learned of KSM
By asking the right questions
And you had minions inform
that no Court of Crimes
Would gain our support for you had begun
The lawlessness that breeds coverup and
Donned the brown shirts and
Liberty bled into the bay as you washed
Away the evidence of interrogation so
Enhance, enhanced you say
The FBI found the bright line
And the fifteen rummy began at
Gitmo, washing the sins tropical and the
Prisoners wept into the blue waters of
The Caribbean
Your thoughts turned to Baghdad
where they had been since the beginning
you made certain
The regime on its knees and you were the victor
Finding the spoils to be volatile
You played puppeteer while Yoo launched the supremacy
Of the Commander
A preening poppycock
Of victory upset by Abu
Ghraib and denials began
Goldsmith fallen on his sword
A hero denied the heroism of withdrawal
And what could have been the end slipped
Away upon a black steed
Supreme intervention on Hamdi
First Mora and then Levin swordfought
Windmills and 2005 came
Zelikow’s words are scattered to the winds
And Justice wept
You caused press paralysis
And Congress checked out
Amnesty International raised the blood specter
To no avail
Your heart was hardened
The Senate betrayed the world with
The
Military
Commissions
Act
Of
2006
And you applauded
Vociferous in your victory
Young Obama protests loudly but in vain,still
the world buzz could not be silenced and
The Constitution wept and bled
You, the Black Prince, endorsed once more
The torture that will not be named and
The Red
Cross
Calls foul and then the leak
And your place in historic infamy grew wings
And still the Commander defends
Five years have gone by
And the world weeps.
War crimes.


Does the end
Justify the means?


You may say
I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one.
I dream of a land
Where this will never happen again.
Your dream stains our soil and denies
Our birthright
You, sir, are no American.

~quidrock 2009

Slamming

In the last decade, the activists among us have chosen a new format...the poetry slam...where, if you feel strongly about anything at all, it is time to express it; in words and in voices where there are no holds barred. Here's one of the best.

I can't, myself, get comfortable with the heat of the slam format for things such as love and loss. It would, however, become a welcome format if, for example, I wanted to express my emotions on current events. Say, the subject of torture.

Andrea Gibson


Andrea’s billed as “an activist poet”. If you choose to watch her poetry slam in the link below, you’ll see why. It’s a powerful chant for women and mothers everywhere. She makes me stand in awe. I can’t yet find the text for her poem “Say Yes”, but in the meantime, here’s an incredible treatise on lost love.. I give you


PHOTOGRAPHS

I wish I was a photograph

tucked into the corners of your wallet

I wish I was a photograph

you carried like a future in your back pocket

I wish I was that face you show to strangers

when they ask you where you come from

I wish I was that someone that you come from

every time you get there

and when you get there

I wish I was that someone who got phone calls

and postcards saying

wish you were here

I wish you were here

autumn is the hardest season

the leaves are all falling

and they're falling like they're falling in love with the ground

and the trees are naked and lonely

I keep trying to tell them

new leaves will come around in the spring

but you can't tell trees those things

they're like me they just stand there

and don't listen

I wish you were here

I've been missing you like crazy

I've been hazy eyed

staring at the bottom of my glass again

thinking of that time when it was so full

it was like we were tapping the moon for moonshine

or sticking straws into the center of the sun

and sipping like icarus would forever kiss

the bullets from our guns

I never meant to fire you know

I know you never meant to fire lover

I know we never meant to hurt each other

now the sky clicks from black to blue

and dusk looks like a bruise

I've been wrapping one night stands

around my body like wedding bands

but none of them fit in the morning

they just slip off my fingers and slip out the door

and all that lingers is the scent of you

I once swore if I threw that scent into a wishing well

all the wishes in the world would come true

do you remember

do you remember the night I told you

I've never seen anything more perfect than

than snow falling in the glow of a street light

electricity bowing to nature

mind bowing to heartbeat

this is gonna hurt bowing to I love you

I still love you like moons love the planets they circle around

like children love recess bells

I still hear the sound of you

and think of playgrounds

where outcasts who stutter

beneath braces and bruises and acne

are finally learning that their rich handsome bullies

are never gonna grow up to be happy

I think of happy when I think of you

so wherever you are I hope you're happy

I really do

I hope the stars are kissing your cheeks tonight

I hope you finally found a way to quit smoking

I hope your lungs are open and breathing your life

I hope there's a kite in your hand

that's flying all the way up to orion

and you still got a thousand yards of string to let out

I hope you're smiling

like god is pulling at the corners of your mouth

cause I might be naked and lonely

shaking branches for bones

but I'm still time zones away

from who I was the day before we met

you were the first mile

where my heart broke a sweat

and I wish you were here

I wish you'd never left

but mostly I wish you well

I wish you my very very best
~Andrea Gibson

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hee7T8MbHGs&feature=player_embedded

A Little Commercial Break from Poetry....

Thematic of the day... get your funk on!!!

My darkness

COBWEBS

Ghostly chamber here

Shrouded in dreams past their time

Will I escape it?

Can it be that I

Have trapped myself in habit?

Will I seek to change?

My future vision

Needs to depend on liberation

From my sad haven.

And escape I must

Lest I find myself surrounded

By days cloaked in cobwebs.

The Darker Side of Poetry...

Empty

She lifts her skirt up to her knees
Walks through the garden rows
With her bare feet laughing

I never learned to count my blessings
I choose instead to dwell
In my disasters

I walk on down the hill
Through grass grown tall
And brown and still
It's hard somehow
To let go of my pain

On past the busted back
Of that old and rusted Cadillac
That sinks into this field
Collecting rain

Will I always feel this way
So empty
And estranged?

And of these cut throat busted sunsets
These cold and damp white mornings
I have grown weary

If through my cracked and dusty
Dime store lips
I spoke these words out loud
Would no one hear me?

Lay your blouse across the chair
Let fall the flowers
From your hair
And kiss me
With that country mouth
So plain

Outside the rain is tapping
On the leaves
To me it sounds like
They're applauding us
The quiet love
We've made

Will it always feel this way
So empty
So estranged?

Well I looked my demons in the eyes
Lay bare my chest
Said do your best
To destroy me

I've been to hell and back
So many times
I must admit
You kinda bore me

There's a lot of things
That can kill a man
There's a lot of ways
To die
Yes, and some already did
And walk beside me

There's a lot of things
I don't understand
So many people lie
It's the hurt I hide that fuels
The fire inside me

Will I always feel this way
So empty
So estranged?

~Ray Lamontagne...from "Till the Sun Turns Black"

Not since Dylan...do I think an American has come along that seems to compose so effortlessly, and paint such stark pictures. For perhaps the best version of "To Love Somebody" ever, see Ray Charles LaMontagne and Damien Rice on youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNJwBaYAtcM

Love and War

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have created volumes of poetry...with more to come. Much is being written by soldiers. My own sentimentality mixes with anger at the length of time some have had to serve in Iraq.....

This is a poem by a poet known only as "Lucy"... I can only hope her loved one comes home again.

Still I Remain

Who is this man,

that can pull a trigger,

and end a life without so much as

the quickening of his heartbeat?

What do his hands grasp now I wonder?

Cold metal, a Commando dagger,

whilst the memory of his soft touch,

still aches on the surface of my skin.

~~~~~~~~~~~

I may not know who he is, but my heart does.

It shouts his name with every beat,

and grieves every second that we’re parted.

It knows every inch of his skin,

and can see the edges of his soul.

Each beat a metronome counting,

the moments until he’s safe in my arms.

~~~~~~~~~~

I didn’t know that fear like this was possible.

But it has become my everyday companion.

I’m waiting for him alone in the darkness,

like a princess locked in a tower,

whilst I spin my fear into hope and,

my love and prayers into a suit of armour,

to keep him safe. Still I remain.

"Lucy"
February 2009

Kelly and the Haiku

I've got haiku all over the place, and crazy Kelly has me digging it all out. Some of it is on notebook paper, some on notecards...heck, I did publish some online. This collection is one of my faves...

Haiku for Booklovers






Soak In A Bath


Never, when I can
Have book time and immerse me
In fast mind escape.

***************************************

Books Can’t Die


Books can’t die or fall
prey to electronic beasts.
Books keep us earthbound.

************************************

Voracious

Bookworm, reader or
Forgetter of what needs me.
Reading on and on.



An Old Friend Jumps Out at You

You’re browsing and
Somewhat bored at the lack
Of books to choose from.

Then, electrified…
You see the long-forgotten
Cherished book, ahhh!


Symbol of Friendship


The spark of finding
That you both read yourselves
Groggy, into night.

Until it is done
And then, satiated a
Moment, you want more.

Of course, I speak of reading books!

Lend a friend one book
You cherish, and seal the bond
Of kinship, always.



A couple of famous people sound off on books:

"Where is human nature so weak as in the bookstore?" ~ Henry Ward Beecher

"Books to the ceiling,
Books to the sky,
My pile of books is a mile high.
How I love them! How I need them!
I'll have a long beard by the time I read them."

~Arnold Lobel

More on Haiku

I've been somewhat aware that most English haiku is actually termed "Senryu" by the purists. The Japanese masters count the sounds, not the syllables, and always include a seasonal word.

Whatever it's called, it's both a puzzle and a writing challenge to compose. Here's a brief explanation:

Haiku Poetry (from poemofquotes.com)

History and Explanation of Haiku

Haiku is a major type of Japanese poetry. Haiku is related to a more ancient form of Japanes poetry called 'hokku', but given its current name by Masaoka Shiki at the end of the 19th century. The name was suggested as an abbreviation of the phrase "haikai no ku" meaning a verse of haikai.

Traditionally haikai is written as one line vertical line, although handwritten form may be in any number of lines. In English, haiku is generally written in three lines to equate to the three parts of a haiku in Japanese that consists of five, seven and then five on (the Japanese count sounds, not syllables). For example, the word 'haiku' contains three "on" (ha-i-ku), but two syllables in English. So producing a poem with seventeen syllables in English is considerably longer than the traditional haiku. (Many purists reject English haiku.)

In Japanese haiku, a kireji (cutting word) is used at the end of one of the three lines. In Japanese there are actual kireji words which act as punctuation, e.g. 'ya' in Bashō's "furuike ya" poem. Since there is no English equivalent to the kireji, other forms of punctuation are used, e.g. comma, colon, ellipses, etc. These "punctuations" are generally used at the end of the first or second line and very rarely found in the middle of the second line. The purpose is to create a relationship between the two parts.

A traditional haiku contains a kigo (season word) that symbolises the season in which the poem is set.

Most Japanese haiku writers see kireji and kigo as non-negotiable requirements. Although many believe kigo are considered essential to traditional haiku, new forms are being implemented without their use. These are called "free-form" haiku.

A similar form of Japanese poetry is the Senryū. The poems contain three lines with 17 or fewer "on" and tend to be about human foibles. They are often cynical or contain dark humor. Senryū do not need to include kigo, unlike most haiku.

Many who claim they write haiku are in fact writing a whole other style. One style which is generally confused as haiku is cinquain. Cinquain, although closely related to haiku, consists of five lines instead of three. Cinquain is also written about an object and/or person and not nature specifically.
In order to write a true haiku poem, it must consist of three lines with five morae in the first, seven in the second while the third and line consists of again five morae. The poem must also be somehow related to nature, while using few words and expressing great emotion.

An example of syllable haiku is:

"Darkness"
Blackened evening sky
Moon shifts across the darkness
Waiting for the sun

However, it is not a traditional haiku. Darkness alone only has 4 morae (da-rk-ne-ss).

The World's Most Famous Haiku is by the Japanese Master, Basho. He lived in the 17th century. Most call it "Frog Haiku".

In Japanese, it meets all the classic requirements for haiku. However, there are over 30 translations to English, some of which DON'T meet a 17 syllable (5-7-5 format). Here's my favorite translation:

Frog Haiku

The old pond is still

a frog leaps right into it

splashing the water

~ Translated by Earl Miner and Hiroko Odagiri

Here's a favorite of mine that uses 5-7-5 SYLLABLES... its from a larger poem, called a renku, and it is by Ferris Gilli:








chandelier swinging


as our loud boogie woogie


rattles the crystal











I guess the lesson is... do you need to follow the rules, (and in Japanese, or English..?) or just have fun with the form....?

Awhile back... I gave this a shot....

I'm no Sharon Olds when it comes to erotic poetry...(see prior post), but I kind of liked the imagery:

Tango

When the night surrendered

…helplessly

to the soft shafts of dawn

streaking up through the cloak

of velvet darkness;

Then the power of the two

…merging, blending together

speaking sensually, senselessly,

without the need for words of

need and fear and longing.

Their voices, in tune…

And, as quickly as what would be done, began…

it finished, fading…

With one, rising, giving strength to day

And one, slumbering, dreaming of

Their coupling when dusk will come again.

Astral tango.

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Crazy quote from the "Margaret and Helen" blog...completely unconnected to this post, but it tickled my funny bone":.....

"Honestly Margaret, I cannot believe that Susan Boyle went undiscovered for 47 years but that crazy Celine Dion has been wailing away for decades making millions. "

Poet Sharon Olds

I'm pretty taken with semi-erotic poetry, for the most part. Poets aren't like romance novels...they leave a lot to the imagination. :)

Ms. Pam introduced me to Sharon Olds..... she writes all types of poetry, but really has a touch with the semi-erotic.

From Pam's blog, earlier this month .... Old's "The Talk"

http://thrivingamidthechaos.blogspot.com/2009/04/in-honor-of-national-poetry-month.html





From Marion's blog, just yesterday .... Old's "The Promise"

http://dragonflyspoetryandprolixity.blogspot.com/2009/04/moody-monday-poems-sharon-olds-and-more.html#comment-form




And, My Favorite: ..... Old's "Topography"

TOPOGRAPHY

After we flew across the country we

got in bed, laid our bodies

delicately together, like maps laid

face to face, East to West, my

San Francisco against your New York, your

Fire Island against my Sonoma, my

New Orleans deep in your Texas, my Idaho

bright on my Great Lakes, my Kansas

burning against your Kansas your Kansas

burning against my Kansas, your Eastern

Standard Time pressing into my

Pacific Time, my Mountain Time

beating against your Central Time, your

sun rising swiftly from the right my

sun rising swiftly from the left your

moon rising slowly from the left my

moon rising slowly from the right until

all four bodies of the sky

burn above us, sealing us together,

all our cities twin cities,

all our states united, one

nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

~Sharon Olds (poet extraordinaire)

Whew! All of those who have been reading, dial it down. Breathe deep. This poem is for lovers of geography and, well, lovers.

Inspired

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Inspired by Ms. Marion, I built a song playlist at the bottom of the page!!! Check it out!

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Yes, we can

We had one of those endless arguments on Pearlsoup about the issues in some of the Southern states where gay couples were not allowed to adopt children who needed them. I figured it to be a good time for "poetry as argument".

It Is The 21st Century




Families come in all shapes
And sizes.

What is right for you may not be
Fitting for me.

Open minds and hearts.
Synergy in sharing lives together.

There is no magic formula
No guarantee of happiness –

We aren’t placed in this world or the next
With a divine plan.

It is ours to make what we can
Of life and love. Of family.

Don’t tell me you are better
Equipped to raise your children than I am.

What we do in life is a measure of
Who we are inside, and not our demo-
Graphic.

Whether I am man or woman
Married or single
Young or old
Black or white or any shade at all.

Diversity.
Get it?

Quidrock 2003

Poems that speak to your own life....

About Living Alone...from the 37 Days Blog

Love After Love

The time will come

when, with elation

you will greet yourself arriving

at your own door, in your own mirror

and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.

You will love again the stranger who was your self.

Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart

to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored

for another, who knows you by heart.

Take down the love letters from the bookshelf, the

photographs, the desperate notes,

peel your own image from the mirror.

Sit. Feast on your life.

~Anonymous

It's always odd....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=debgoWX1tLU

I think that poets and writers have "favorite works" that are not necessarily as well-received as their material that is less personal. My own favorite was written in the aftermath of the reunion concert of Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel (you'll probably guess who I was more partial to!). The pair meant a lot to me in my formative years of late teens and 20's. I couldn't help myself but buy tickets to see them reunited, and I was not disappointed.

You may not like the poem as much as I do, because you don't have the underlying emotions of thinking back to what you were, when you first heard their music. And then again, you may be too young to know.....

MUSIC MAN

A minor deity walks among us

Dobro, cello and 12 string unravel his sounds

His hands cannot stay still

Unlike a singer who focuses on words

Leaving diaphragm diaphanously

Moved by sound needing to touch it

His words float among the rafters

They soar and his partner of the angel’s whine

Frosts them with magnificent cushions of harmony.

~~~


Soothsayer, poet, teller of tales



Maker of rhymes and those lines that don’t



We are humbled by the music, inspired by the words



Touched in a way we did not expect



Arrested are we, applauding endlessly



I stop to grip my heart.



Small of stature



Shaken by response and experience



Wearing his passion for his music “like a thorny crown”.


~~~


My simple act of grasping a memory



Bringing a dear one for a night of music



Becomes strangely alive with the soul and the sound of



This man, who with his songs, has touched lives and burned



Aging melodies into our very being.



Foreshadowing his eulogy he appears



An Old Friend



Made new again by the enormity



Of thousands of words grasping souls, taking prisoners.
Brought tears to thousands, peace to all



Shook us to our foundations



Never was much, he was just his father’s son.



I stand and remember, in awe.




~Quidrock 2003



Simon & Garfunkel – “Old Friends” Tour, the morning after

Margaret Atwood

Best known for her fiction (The Handmaid's Tale, The Blind Assassin, Oryx and Crake), Canadian Margaret Atwood has been writing poetry for 4 decades. She has not published new poetry since 1992... her poetry is frank and disarming. Here's one of my favorites:

MORE AND MORE

More and more frequently the edges

of me dissolve and I become

a wish to assimilate the world, including

you, if possible through the skin

like a cool plant's tricks with oxygen

and live by a harmless green burning.

I would not consume

you or ever

finish, you would still be there

surrounding me, complete

as the air.

Unfortunately I don't have leaves.

Instead I have eyes

and teeth and other non-green

things which rule out osmosis.

So be careful, I mean it,

I give you fair warning:

This kind of hunger draws

everything into its own

space; nor can we

talk it all over, have a calm

rational discussion.

There is no reason for this, only

a starved dog's logic about bones.

~Margaret Atwood

Tones of Brown

I’m sketching you in tones of brown.
I don’t know why.
When I think of you, it is in terms
Of greens and blues,
Alive and ethereal.

Perhaps that is because so much
Time has passed us by,
And taken from us the delicious
Honeyed juice of our youth and our love..
Or was it merely fancy?

And yet, the sketch is somewhat golden
And warm, and the day is a pleasant
Reminder of Monterey
And our coastal path of discovery
Days spent in laughter.

I cannot taste a cold
Sweet caramel chardonnay without
Thoughts of the windy patio
Where we said goodbye
And laced our fingers together
For the last time.

And the coming days became brown.

Just brown.

~quidrock

The poem dates back to 2003... the memories of Monterey some 25 years.....

Some of the most heartfelt poems of the new century

Are those that deal with the grief after 9/11. I've read a lot of tribute poetry, commemorating the day.

I like the poems that are subtle...the ones that talk about how you feel in the aftermath, how the world has changed. Here's one of my favorites:

Normally

I have no politics to speak of,

but last week I bought a paperback version

of American History for Beginners.

At breakfast, I turned to the plume

of Hiroshima while munching

on the dark side of toast.

I was reminded of the beauty

of gesture--the “duck and cover” we learned

in grade school and how we crouched

under our desks from the Cold War.

I never talk to strangers.

But on Cobb Lane,

I smiled at a woman walking a collie

and wanted to hug her dog.

I’m not religious,

but for the first time in years,

I go to church, chant the Nicene Creed, hunger

for something clean--wings, say.

Usually I wake at 6, brew coffee,

pack my knapsack, pull the door to,

and walk six-tenths of a mile to the train.

Today I slept late, dreaming

of flying in a small plane in a wobbly sky.

At the station, passengers loaded with hearts

come aboard, checking their watches.

Normally I don’t describe them.

Today I can’t help noticing the upright

bodies, the feet angled in as if to stay,

the tickettaker who hitches up his pants

and waits. Usually I look out the window,

or read the Times. Today I notice how

a little boy’s hair shines in the sun

and have the urge to feel his warmth

through my palm. I wonder about the synapses

that fire beneath the scalpor our forward facing feet

when all we want is to go back.

Normally, I write about what I feel.

Now my biggest fear is failed

poems--the kind that take you

just short of understanding

and leave you there--your

hope thin, combustible

as the white flesh of cigarettes.

~Elizabeth Harrington

The heat is on....

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Some formats of poetry lend themselves to certain topics. The triolet is an old French form. Naturally, when I've dabbled with the format, it usually leads to my seamier side of poetry. Here's a series of three triolets.... written in the same weekend. As the weekend went on, it got hotter and hotter.

Wash Over Me (in triolet form)

Wash over me, your smile
Your quiet acceptance of who and what I am.
I don’t need constant reassurance.
Wash over me, your smile
I’m content in your sphere
Alive in your presence
Wash over me, your smile
Your quiet acceptance of who and what I am.

The Heat (in triolet form)

The heat that grows slowly
Knowing no boundary.
Delicious in its ravenous need,
The heat that grows slowly
Leaves me aching, arching
Into you, never without
The heat that grows slowly
Knowing no boundary.

Coupling (in triolet form)


Locked in tangled embrace
Skin to skin, I shudder.
How is it that each time is the first?
Locked in tangled embrace
Your touch ripples small shocks through me
Breathtaking, my spirit joins my body in the fire
Locked in tangled embrace
Skin to skin, I shudder.

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I hope she will not mind

There is a poet known as Raven, whose poems are shatteringly beautiful. Although I have read many, I have saved few, much to my dismay. She is a friend here. I hope that when she checks in she won't mind my printing of one of the few I have of hers..a treatise on friendship. Hers means the world to me, and, indeed is "rich and abundant". I think of her often.

THAT STRANGE MAGIC

Kindred souls meet.

Opposites attract.

Lives intertwine

as people move and stir each other.

A bond will blossom.

As friends are born.

That strange, unpredictable magic,

which we call friendship.

Colouring and enriching life.

As you learn from and enjoy each other.

Rich and abundant, with many nuances.

Not unlike a tree in the prime of its life.

You grow both.

Life would be threadbare without them.

But friends must breathe, like trees.

Allow them space and freedom,do not suffocate each other.

Too often this is ignored.

Otherwise things go awry.

Then, the wonderful magic will be broken.

Like those trees friendships can die.

~Raven

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From an Easter past...

Not the most religious of individuals, I attended an Easter service a few years ago that inspired this poem....

THESE PERFECT MOMENTS

Watching your dog chase his tail.

Watching your baby raise a tiny fist,


Then focus and eyes grow wide as she realizes it is hers.




Going outdoors in the early morning


Focus on the sunlight that falls on the hibiscus tree


The blooms open in slow motion.




Vast rainbow rising


As the mist clears on a summer day


And the slow sun begins to warm the ground


Made green velvet by the rain.




Steaming pottery mug


Of freshly ground coffee, brewed


With a hint of cinnamon.


The aroma rises as you add


Milk or cream, and give the rich coffee a brief stir.




Sense of complete communion


With self and maker, sitting


The 12–string guitar makes rich


The music of the day.


Dawn services at Easter.


You think you know how the world seemed, then.

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Live from the Master

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You Tube is a treasure trove of Billy Collins' poetry. The former Poet Laureate has allowed many of his poems to be set to animated short films. My own preference, however, is to watch the videos of Collins reading Collins. Here's a particular favorite, with Collins describing my own frustration....being stuck, for whatever reasons, in Florida, while my heart wishes to travel. It's called "Consolation"....

Enjoy!

Some images never leave you....

I had a serious car accident in 1994, and narrowly escaped one two decades before that. In both instances, what has stayed with me through the years is the sounds, the horrible, jarring sounds that seemingly never go away and wake you, years later, drenched in terror, reliving it all again. Not much of my poetry is caught up in drama or events... but this one materialized after I narrowly escaped an accident near Clearwater, FL, in 2003.

WASTED AFTERNOON OF TWISTED METAL

Just another traffic jam.

Blocked for miles, lanes of traffic

Simmering with the lack of forward movement.

Time passes and your fears and frustration mount.

What haunts me are the sounds

Strident blare of sirens

Fumbling moves to the grass

Out of the way as ambulance passes.

We try to find pavement again

Plotting strategy, nowhere to exit.

When a second vehicle of death and damage

Elbows its way through, siren screaming its mission.

Now a vague uneasiness settles

We all wonder about the human suffering

Ahead, and wish

To be anywhere but here.

Minutes pass and there is a channel

Finally a way to the outside

Off the path, small road, too much egress

Stopped, waiting.

“Squeal” too tame to describe

The fierce cacophony

Of brakes applied roughly

Trying to hold, failing, seeming doubled in volume.

Followed by the rough horror

Of metal on metal

A crunching agony of twisting

Damage is a haunting sound.

Rough embrace of power from behind

Pushing, shredding both mine and

My neighbor’s car, the other lane

Also in fierce crescendo.

And then silence

The impact too intrusive,

Too surreal and invasive to believe.

Out of the car, try to breathe.

Accident caused by accident

Everyone stunned and broken

Thankful that there are no bleeding injuries.

At my side an aching throb of wounded ribs.

We survey the twisted kingdom

Of men’s chariots, now in pieces.

The waiting begins for

The arrival of the peace officers.

For at last, there is peace for us

Nowhere to go, little to say

Nothing to accomplish

Needing to pick up the pieces

And move on.

The sounds will resonate in dreams.

*

*

Someone else's

I have met many poets online. I believe in my heart that all poets cannot resist the urge to spill their lives onto paper. They're not writing factually, they're not following established formulas, like in fiction. Normally, they're just bleeding their emotions all over the paper.

Someone that I've lost for now, whose poetry I greatly admire is a young "tragederian" poet from Michigan, Jon Meredith, who writes ghostly poems of love and loss in the aftermath of his divorce and separation from his children. Here is one of Jon's. Jon, wherever you are, I hope you google this and find us all again. But more than that, I hope your life runs smoothly..


I AM


I am
a voice inside your head,
the anger in your bed.
I am
the darkest soulful night
and our brightest light.
I am
the air you breathe,
a nicotine fix you need,
the one you hope to get
and the things you can’t forget.
I am, I am.

I am
the sweet birthing flower,
our endless final hour,
burning summer swelter
in your icy igloo shelter,
the song that makes you cry,
a toxic spill that gets you high,
the kiss that brings you back
from a late-night sneak attack.
So don’t try to fight me.
You didn’t invite me,
but I’m here for good,
like something you didn’t but should.
Unwrap the sticky wrapper -
put new batteries in your Clapper
for I unfold the hidden dark,
like a walk too late through the park.
Fill your cup like amber ginger ale,
these shadows will make you pale.


I am
the sweaty shadow of man,
congealed grease in your brain pan.
I am
the kiss you say you need,
the honesty of your greed.
I am
an unsuspecting desert rain,
the pleasure in your pain,
all the things that you project
to hide the dirt that you protect.
I am, I am.

So tell me, tell me, tell me
of the fire in your belly,
the prize you wrap in silk
to suckle like mother’s milk.
Drop down to your knees
before the god you please,
gonna make you scream hallelujah
when you let that spirit do ya.
All brothers and sisters in crime,
our fullness revealed in time.

~Jon Meredith

One of mine

I started writing poetry again in 2002, some 25 years after I'd stopped. I had forgotten how much it meant to me. It was easy to start again with Haiku.

The Lightning Series
Haiku






Lightning shreds the calm.
Power immeasurable.
Then hostile silence.

God’s semaphore
Marking the sky again with
His own mystery.

Some vertically
Some snaking across the sky
Lightning calls to you.

Each day’s symbol
Lightning storms remind you that
You miss the calm sky.

Lightning flashes thrice
Conducting a symphony
Of storm and thunder.

Opening your mind
Bolts of lightning "whisper" that
Greater power exists.


Quidrock….copyright 2002

The Amazing Pablo Neruda

He wrote this in 1959. I was 5. Half a century later, here it is again.

LXXXIX



When I die, I want your hands on my eyes:
I want the light and the wheat of your beloved hands
to pass their freshness over me once more:
I want to feel the softness that changed my destiny.



I want you to live while I wait for you, asleep.
I want your ears still to hear the wind,
I want you to sniff the sea's aroma that we loved together,
to continue to walk on the sand we walk on.
I want what I love to continue to live,
and you whom I love and sang above everything else
to continue to flourish, full-flowered:
so that you can reach everything my love directs you to,
so that my shadow can travel along in your hair,
so that everything can learn the reason for my song.





~Pablo Neruda


*
*

On Love

Love is complicated

Complicated is a word that
Creates a puzzle for the mind.

The puzzle becomes
The force behind our lives
Together. Are we…

A true “force” or just
A tangled snarl of needs
And passions, expressing
Anguish by the deep need that drives us?

Will it drive us forward?
Who can say what time may one day tell?
Whether we are one and true or
Walking together out of convenience
With wisdom all but left behind.

Left behind with the shattered
Leftovers of past lives.
Lives that knew not each other
Loves that have passed before.
Loneliness held at bay by two together.
Love is complicated.

I wrote this one April. It's a form that I sort of stumbled into that I called "acrecentar". There are 6 stanzas... the first has one line, the next two..and so forth. In this particular poem, the starting letter of each line of each stanza is the same. It took a long time to sift through and select the words and thought to keep the story and the form at the same time. Poetry. It's wonderful.

*

Songwriters as poets

BORN IN TIME



In the lonely night

In the blinking stardust of a pale blue light

You're comin' thru to me in black and white

When we were made of dreams.





You're blowing down the shaky street,

You're hearing my heart beat

In the record breaking heat

Where we were born in time.





Not one more night, not one more kiss,

Not this time baby, no more of this.

Takes too much skill, takes too much will.

It's revealing.

You came, you saw, just like the law

You married young, just like your ma,

You tried and tried, you made me slide

You left me reelin' with this feelin'.






On the rising curve

Where the ways of nature will test every nerve,

You won't get anything you don't deserve

Where we were born in time.







You pressed me once, you pressed me twice,

You hang the flame, you'll pay the price.

Oh babe, that fire

Is still smokin'.






You were snow, you were rain

You were striped, you were plain,

Oh babe, truer words

Have not been spoken or broken.







In the hills of mystery,

In the foggy web of destiny,

You can have what's left of me,

Where we were born in time.



~Bob Dylan 1989





I was never as much of a fan of poetry in song lyrics as my friend Dragonfly. Those song lyrics, well, they rhyme much of the time. That's not a good thing in quid's world of poetry. And yet, as I've listened to Dragonfly theorize about this, I realize that every once in awhile there's a song that stops my heart. And sure enough, when you look closer, when you get a chance to peruse those liner notes.... it's all about the symmetry of thoughts strung together.. what those words meant to the one who wrote them, and how you translate them into your own existence.



"Under the Red Sky" is a little known, kinda self-indulgent Dylan album from a period where he struggled with his own fame. He wrote this particularly beautiful song, "Born In Time" for the album somewhere around 1989. I came across the song in 1990.. it had some particular testing notes for me when I was struggling with my marriage. At 11 years old, with big changes coming around the corner of our union, we pulled it out of the flames. Only to extinguish it later. I still can't hear this song without instantly being transported back to that time.

A Favorite

I’ll Join You


Pages turned with your left hand
Cheek rests lightly on your right.
You don’t see me watching you.

Absorbed in your reading
Gold-rimmed glasses keep
Far-sightedness at bay.

You can shut the noisy world out,
Lost in the words on the page,
Comfortable with your momentary solitude.

But I, (unwisely?) watch too long,
And you slowly glance up.
Time stops. You know without asking.

Know I’ve been memorizing you, mesmerized by you
I’ll be able to replay your moment
In my car, at my desk, whenever need takes me over.

You could be self-conscious,
Or puzzled, or naïve.
But you’re not.

Your instincts are powerful
And you can feel my longing
In an instant.

And, just as sure of my ground
I can feel that heat
Reflected back at me, on me.

Don’t get up.
I have my book.
I’ll join you.

***

~quidrock

***National Poetry Month***

The Poetic Art of "The Phrase"

Sometimes a poem will catch you up in a phrase, a particular twist of words, and you'll borrow them going forward and make them your own. This particular poem is by an amateur poet... and while I love the entire poem (and know women of this ilk), the phrase I was captivated by, when I first read it, was.....

"smudged his vinyl"

perhaps that's what we do when we make our impression on someone's life.. we leave a smudge on their vinyl. Or, we do, if we're old enough to remember listening on vinyl. Sigh. Not sure about those under 30. Hopefully, if you read this blog, you'll grin at the idea of smudging each other's vinyl.

For the Record

She dances for him on the head of a needle,

Never minding the fact

That his record is scratched,

So from time to time, she skips

From his verse of "I love you"

To his chorus of apologies,

Because in her ears, it's all music.

As the record spins, she searches for proof

That she has made an impression,

A sign that she has altered his flow,

But no fingerprint of her own has smudged his vinyl;

He bears no evidence of her existence.

So she listens more closely and hopes to hear

A hint of herself mixed into his melodies,

But the speakers sing only the songs he desires,

And she plans her steps by his cadence,

Manipulates herself into his grooves,

Seeks her heart within his beat,

Never realizing that she could turn tables.

~Calandra R. Butler

***National Poetry Month***

One of Mine

It's April 2, and I had the great pleasure of being on a rooftop on the Gulf Coast at 7:47 when the sun set. If I get a good picture back from the experience, I'll replace the one above.

There was a crowd there. As the sun disappeared into a cloud bank ten minutes before it was due to set, the crowd grumbled and dispersed. Chances are, a lot of them hit that selfsame rooftop each evening after work to let the particularly warm beauty of that sun change the color and the tenor of whatever day they had.

Those who gave up too soon missed a particular bit of beauty. The entire globe of hot orange sun disappeared behind a gray layer, and, in what seemed like a heartbeat to those of us who remained, the bottom rim of the sun came peaking out of that layer, followed by the entire miracle. We watched it disappear, reappear (in reverse) and then melt into the horizon in less than 4 minutes time. Phenomenal.

A poem I wrote in 2003 on a particularly memorable beach day in Sarasota:

SUNRISE, SUNSET

Ribbon clouds, ready

To disappear as dawn lights

Early morning sky.

Bands of pastel hue

Dance on the horizon when

Night passes to day.

The world bursts forth in eager anticipation.

Ah! The shore at dusk

Sweetened with the magic

Of God's paintbrush.

Sunset on a hill

Colored sky overlooks

Deepening twilight.

The day retires slowly, drawing us into sleep.

~

The Poem That Can't Be Written

The Poem That

Can't Be Written

is different from the poem
that is not written, or the many

that are never finished—those boats
lost in the fog, adrift

in the windless latitudes,
the charts useless, the water gone.

In the poem that cannot
be written there is no danger,

no ponderous cargo of meaning,
no meaning at all. And this

is its splendor, this is how
it becomes an emblem,

not of failure or loss,
but of the impossible.

So the wind rises. The tattered sails
billow, and the air grows sweeter.

A green island appears.
Everyone is saved.

~Lawrence Raab 2009

It is poetry month. To begin, one of my new favorites....poets enjoy writing poetry about poetry.