Poetry Month: Day Thirty

And so, I end this month-long tip of the hat to Poetry Month with another poem-prophetic.

I am reminded too, of so many porches filled now with emptiness;

barren swings and rocking chairs where stories used to sit. I see loved ones lingering in the twilight, soon to take sweet rest. Of all the seats in the house, yours with mine is best.

Thinking back over the porches we've shared,sitting in hammocks or worn-out lawn chairs- beautiful landscapes or time passing through, the view is improved for watching with you.

 

They Sit Together on the Porch

Wendell Berry



They sit together on the porch, the dark

Almost fallen, the house behind them dark.

Their supper done with, they have washed and dried

The dishes–only two plates now, two glasses,

Two knives, two forks, two spoons–small work for two.

She sits with her hands folded in her lap,

At rest. He smokes his pipe. They do not speak,

And when they speak at last it is to say

What each one knows the other knows. They have

One mind between them, now, that finally

For all its knowing will not exactly know

Which one goes first through the dark doorway, bidding

Goodnight, and which sits on a while alone.

Poetry Month: Day Twenty-Nine

One of my favorites. 

LITANY

BILLY COLLINS

You are the bread and the knife,

The crystal goblet and the wine...

-Jacques Crickillon

You are the bread and the knife,

the crystal goblet and the wine.

You are the dew on the morning grass

and the burning wheel of the sun.

You are the white apron of the baker,

and the marsh birds suddenly in flight.

However, you are not the wind in the orchard,

the plums on the counter,

or the house of cards.

And you are certainly not the pine-scented air.

There is just no way that you are the pine-scented air.

It is possible that you are the fish under the bridge,

maybe even the pigeon on the general's head,

but you are not even close

to being the field of cornflowers at dusk.

And a quick look in the mirror will show

that you are neither the boots in the corner

nor the boat asleep in its boathouse.

It might interest you to know,

speaking of the plentiful imagery of the world,

that I am the sound of rain on the roof.

I also happen to be the shooting star,

the evening paper blowing down an alley

and the basket of chestnuts on the kitchen table.

I am also the moon in the trees

and the blind woman's tea cup.

But don't worry, I'm not the bread and the knife.

You are still the bread and the knife.

You will always be the bread and the knife,

not to mention the crystal goblet and--somehow--the wine.

Poetry Month: Day Twenty-Eight

I have often been accused of talking too much to strangers.

 Or as someone recently put it,

 * "Everytime I turn around, you're talking to some new weird featherplucker." 



While this poem seems to be going opposite my direction, by speaking to few if any

along its mosey way, it could easily find itself going my way, up on the freeway

of imediate and immersive conversation, if as seatmate it dared to catch my eye

or if as waitress, it braved a friendly smile. Strangers no more, atttentive

I would listen as it unpacked.





Follow the linked title to the poem and an interview with Billy Collins

Traveling Alone 

Billy Collins



At the hotel coffee shop that morning, the waitress was wearing a pink uniform with “Florence” written in script over her heart. 

And the man who checked my bag had a nameplate that said “Ben.” Behind him was a long row of royal palms. 

On the plane, two women poured drinks from a cart they rolled down the aisle—“Debbie” and “Lynn” according to their winged tags.

And such was my company as I arced from coast to coast, and so I seldom spoke, and then only of the coffee, the bag, the tiny bottles of vodka.

I said little more than “Thank you” and “Can you take this from me, please?” Yet I began to sense that all of them were ready to open up, to get to know me better, perhaps begin a friendship.

Florence looked irritated as she shuffled from table to table, but was she just hiding her need to know about my early years—the ball I would toss and catch in my hands the times I hid behind my mother’s dress?

And was I so wrong in seeing in Ben’s eyes a glimmer of interest in my theories and habits—my view of the Enlightenment, my love of cards, the hours I tended to keep?

And what about Debbie and Lynn? Did they not look eager to ask about my writing process, my way of composing in the morning by a window, which I would have admitted if they had just had the courage to ask.

And strangely enough—I would have continued as they stopped pouring drinks and the other passengers turned to listen— the only emotion I ever feel, Debbie and Lynn, is what the beaver must feel, as he bears each stick to his hidden construction, which creates the tranquil pond and gives the mallards somewhere to paddle, the pair of swans a place to conceal their young.

 

* For the record: outside the froyo place, @the time my spontaneous friendships with 'weird featherpluckers' was called into question, it was Bubba who spoke first, to me and everyone else on the patio. He wanted all of us to know that he found his chosen flavor like eating frozen sour cream. He knew it might seem odd, but would we care for a bite to see for ourselves? I politely declined but it was good old fashioned manners that went on to obligate me to quip that they need a burrito flavor to match. While I might conceded to being amiable, at times downright chatty- I could never bring myself to use such fowl language as 'featherpluckers'. While I can give no good defence as to why such exchanges frequently find me, I'm certainly glad they do. 

Poetry Month: Day Twenty-Seven

Found this in an old New Yorker discard years back. It's clipped and pasted in an old journal...somewhere.

 Horse Piano

Anna MacDonald

The idea is to get a horse, a Central Park workhorse.

A horse who lives in a city, over in the hell part of Hell’s Kitchen, in a big metal tent.

You have to get one who is dying.

Maybe you get his last day on the job, his owner, his     tourists.

You get his walk back home at the end of the day,

some flies, some drool. You get his deathbed, maybe.

And then, post mortem, still warm, you get the vet or else     the butcher

to take his three best legs. And then you get the taxidermist     to stuff them

heavy, with some alloy, steel, something.

Next day you go over to Christie’s interiors sale and buy a     baby-grand piano,

shabby condition but tony provenance, let’s say it graced the     entry hall

of some or other Vanderbilt’s Gold Coast classic six.

And you ask the welder you know to carefully replace the     piano legs

with the horse legs, and you put the horse/piano somewhere     like a lobby,

and you hire a guy to play it on the hour, so that everybody     will know

how much work it is to hold anything up in this world.

Poetry Month: Day Twenty-Six

 

I recently snagged a copy of  O, What A Luxury to add to my Keillor shelf. Though I have read most Keillor titles,  I tend to wait to adopt new family members until Fate sends them my way via thrift store or Friends of the Library sales. Both of the pictured volumes were gleaned from the limbs of ye old Dollar Tree. They're probably missing half their rhymes,  but I would never discriminate against a book with special needs. They're good enough just the way they are. (Just this week I rescued two crayon-ed picture books -one an Eric Carle!- from library discard...almost every word can still be made out, have they no heart?) Enough of my yammering,  let's talk about the things that go down after dark.

FORBIDDEN

Garrison Keillor

Forbidden tastes, secret delights

Guilty pleasures late at night

So many things a person wants

Are not found in restaurants

When I suffer from heartbreak

I like some Chocolate Bacon Cake

You won’t find it on the grocery shelf

You’ve got to make it for yourself

You have to keep it very quiet

But someday you ought to try it

At night when no one is awake

Chocolate Bacon Cake.

Don’t be scandalized, don’t be flustered

But I love fried eggs with a smear of mustard

And now I’m alone and everyone’s gone

I fry the eggs, get out the Dijon

And smear it on a couple slices.

Mustard. I feel like Dionysus

And may I add in parentheses

Anything is good with cheese.

Meatloaf stuffed with ricotta

If you haven’t had it, maybe you oughta.

Meatloaf in which ricotta is piled.

You won’t find it in Julia Child

But it’s so juicy and delicious

You eat it and it softly squishes

Or for a taste of true romance

A grilled cheese sandwich with pecans,

Green onions, swiss cheese, and yes ma’am

A dollop of raspberry jam.

Or cheese and peanut butter on white bread

Dipped in batter, I’ve heard it said,

Dipped in batter and then deep fried

A secret pleasure that must be tried.

No, you won’t find it in Julia

But deep fried peanut butter is truly a

Life saver, and nothing is better

Than toast with jam, baloney and cheddar

Or eggs and cheese and grits and toss

On a squirt or two of Tabasco sauce

Forbidden tastes, secret delights

Guilty pleasures late at night

So many things a person wants

Are not found in restaurants

And if nobody else is near—

A glass of tomato juice with beer

If it’s dark I might spread

Peanut butter on soft white bread

And a couple pickles on the side,

Eat it and feel pacified

Or peanut butter, mustard, and baloney

A delicacy among the Shoshone

There’s nothing cures your cares and woes

Quite like a couple sloppy Joes.

Julia loved her joes to be sloppy.

She wrote it in her French Chef copy

Sloppy Joes calmed and steadied her.

It was taken out by an editor.

Forbidden tastes, secret delights

Guilty pleasures late at night

So many things a person wants

Are not found in restaurants

If you’re in need of sympathy,

Try chocolate, basil, and brie

In a panini, heated, and which

Could be followed by a peanut butter banana sandwich

Which some say is the most

Delicious served up on burnt toast.

Others cure their miseries

With pancakes made with cottage cheese.

Or go to the kitchen, get out the bowls

Have chili and cinnamon roll.

You don’t know what pleasure means

The acme of the world’s cuisines

The epitome of class and status—

Put baked beans on baked potatoes.

Lay them out in two nice stratas

Baked beans on baked potatoes.

Don’t tell them or him or her

It’s what you secretly prefer

And if you’re still hungry, for goodness sake,

There’s always Chocolate Bacon cake.

Poetry Month: Day Twenty-Five

Today's poem, gleaned from my Poetry Foundation email archive, reminds us that worry gets you nowhere.

Suppose

Phoebe Cary

 

Suppose, my little lady,

      Your doll should break her head,

Could you make it whole by crying

      Till your eyes and nose are red?

And would n’t it be pleasanter

      To treat it as a joke;

And say you ’re glad “’T was Dolly’s

      And not your head that broke?”

Suppose you ’re dressed for walking,

      And the rain comes pouring down,

Will it clear off any sooner

      Because you scold and frown?

And would n’t it be nicer

      For you to smile than pout,

And so make sunshine in the house

      When there is none without?

Suppose your task, my little man,

      Is very hard to get,

Will it make it any easier

      For you to sit and fret?

And would n’t it be wiser

      Than waiting like a dunce,

To go to work in earnest

      And learn the thing at once?

Suppose that some boys have a horse,

      And some a coach and pair,

Will it tire you less while walking

      To say, “It is n’t fair?”

And would n’t it be nobler

      To keep your temper sweet,

And in your heart be thankful

      You can walk upon your feet?

And suppose the world don’t please you,

      Nor the way some people do,

Do you think the whole creation

      Will be altered just for you?

And is n’t it, my boy or girl,

      The wisest, bravest plan,

Whatever comes, or does n’t come,

      To do the best you can?

Poetry Month: Day Twenty-Four

I love this one so much. Found it on Poetry Fountation's app. It made me laugh and it made me think of certain beloved and aging uncles with whom i have enjoyed many a candid conversation. 

How to Be Perfect

Ron Padgett

Get some sleep.

Don't give advice.

Take care of your teeth and gums.

Don't be afraid of anything beyond your control. Don't be afraid, for

instance, that the building will collapse as you sleep, or that someone

you love will suddenly drop dead.

Eat an orange every morning.

Be friendly. It will help make you happy.

Raise your pulse rate to 120 beats per minute for 20 straight minutes

four or five times a week doing anything you enjoy.

Hope for everything. Expect nothing.

Take care of things close to home first. Straighten up your room

before you save the world. Then save the world.

Know that the desire to be perfect is probably the veiled expression

of another desire—to be loved, perhaps, or not to die.

Make eye contact with a tree.

Be skeptical about all opinions, but try to see some value in each of

them.

Dress in a way that pleases both you and those around you.

Do not speak quickly.

Learn something every day. (Dzien dobre!)

Be nice to people before they have a chance to behave badly.

Don't stay angry about anything for more than a week, but don't

forget what made you angry. Hold your anger out at arm's length

and look at it, as if it were a glass ball. Then add it to your glass ball

collection.

Be loyal.

Wear comfortable shoes.

Design your activities so that they show a pleasing balance

and variety.

Be kind to old people, even when they are obnoxious. When you

become old, be kind to young people. Do not throw your cane at

them when they call you Grandpa. They are your grandchildren!

Live with an animal.

Do not spend too much time with large groups of people.

If you need help, ask for it.

Cultivate good posture until it becomes natural.

If someone murders your child, get a shotgun and blow his head off.

Plan your day so you never have to rush.

Show your appreciation to people who do things for you, even if you

have paid them, even if they do favors you don't want.

Do not waste money you could be giving to those who need it.

Expect society to be defective. Then weep when you find that it is far

more defective than you imagined.

When you borrow something, return it in an even better condition.

As much as possible, use wooden objects instead of plastic or metal

ones.

Look at that bird over there.

After dinner, wash the dishes.

Calm down.

Visit foreign countries, except those whose inhabitants have

expressed a desire to kill you.

Don't expect your children to love you, so they can, if they want to.

Meditate on the spiritual. Then go a little further, if you feel like it.

What is out (in) there?

Sing, every once in a while.

Be on time, but if you are late do not give a detailed and lengthy

excuse.

Don't be too self-critical or too self-congratulatory.

Don't think that progress exists. It doesn't.

"Walk upstairs.

Do not practice cannibalism.

Imagine what you would like to see happen, and then don't do

anything to make it impossible.

Take your phone off the hook at least twice a week.

Keep your windows clean.

Extirpate all traces of personal ambitiousness.

Don't use the word extirpate too often.

Forgive your country every once in a while. If that is not possible, go

to another one.

If you feel tired, rest.

Grow something.

Do not wander through train stations muttering, "We're all going to

die!"

Count among your true friends people of various stations of life.

Appreciate simple pleasures, such as the pleasure of chewing, the

pleasure of warm water running down your back, the pleasure of a

cool breeze, the pleasure of falling asleep.

Do not exclaim, "Isn't technology wonderful!"

Learn how to stretch your muscles. Stretch them every day.

Don't be depressed about growing older. It will make you feel even

older. Which is depressing.

Do one thing at a time.

If you burn your finger, put it in cold water immediately. If you bang

your finger with a hammer, hold your hand in the air for twenty

minutes. You will be surprised by the curative powers of coldness and

gravity.

Learn how to whistle at earsplitting volume.

Be calm in a crisis. The more critical the situation, the calmer you

should be.

Enjoy sex, but don't become obsessed with it. Except for brief periods

in your adolescence, youth, middle age, and old age.

Contemplate everything's opposite.

If you're struck with the fear that you've swum out too far in the

ocean, turn around and go back to the lifeboat.

Keep your childish self alive.

Answer letters promptly. Use attractive stamps, like the one with a

tornado on it.

Cry every once in a while, but only when alone. Then appreciate

how much better you feel. Don't be embarrassed about feeling better.

Do not inhale smoke.

Take a deep breath.

Do not smart off to a policeman.

Do not step off the curb until you can walk all the way across the

street. From the curb you can study the pedestrians who are trapped

in the middle of the crazed and roaring traffic.

Be good.

Walk down different streets.

Backwards.

Remember beauty, which exists, and truth, which does not. Notice

that the idea of truth is just as powerful as the idea of beauty.

Stay out of jail.

In later life, become a mystic.

Use Colgate toothpaste in the new Tartar Control formula.

Visit friends and acquaintances in the hospital. When you feel it is

time to leave, do so.

Be honest with yourself, diplomatic with others.

Do not go crazy a lot. It's a waste of time.

Read and reread great books.

Dig a hole with a shovel.

In winter, before you go to bed, humidify your bedroom.

Know that the only perfect things are a 300 game in bowling and a

27-batter, 27-out game in baseball.

Drink plenty of water. When asked what you would like to drink,

say, "Water, please."

Ask "Where is the loo?" but not "Where can I urinate?"

Be kind to physical objects.

Beginning at age forty, get a complete "physical" every few years

from a doctor you trust and feel comfortable with.

Don't read the newspaper more than once a year.

Learn how to say "hello," "thank you," and "chopsticks"

in Mandarin.

Belch and fart, but quietly.

Be especially cordial to foreigners.

See shadow puppet plays and imagine that you are one of the

characters. Or all of them.

Take out the trash.

Love life.

Use exact change.

When there's shooting in the street, don't go near the window.

Poetry Month: Day Twenty-Three

From my favorites list on Poetry Foundation's Mobile App:

Uncouplings

Craig Arnold

There is no I in teamwork

but there is a two maker

there is no I in together

but there is a got three

a get to her

the I in relationship

is the heart I slip on

a lithe prison

in all communication

we count on a mimic

(I am not uncomic)

our listening skills

are silent killings

there is no we in marriage

but a grim area

there is an I in family

also my fail.

Poetry Month: Day Twenty-Two

Another poem previously shared with my youngest brother  and now shared with you-  via Poetry Foundation's poetry app.

In Love, His Grammar Grew

Stephen Dunn

In love, his grammar grew

rich with intensifiers, and adverbs fell

madly from the sky like pheasants

for the peasantry, and he, as sated

as they were, lolled under shade trees

until roused by moonlight

and the beautiful fraternal twins

and and but. Oh that was when

he knew he couldn’t resist

a conjunction of any kind.

One said accumulate, the other

was a doubter who loved the wind

and the mind that cleans up after it.

                                           For love

he wanted to break all the rules,

light a candle behind a sentence

named Sheila, always running on

and wishing to be stopped

by the hard button of a period.

Sometimes, in desperation, he’d look

toward a mannequin or a window dresser

with a penchant for parsing.

But mostly he wanted you, Sheila,

and the adjectives that could precede

and change you: bluesy, fly-by-night,

queen of all that is and might be.

Poetry Month: Day Twenty-One

Poetry Foundation's mobile app allows you to save and share poems that tickle your fancy. I recently switched to a new phone and, to rebuild my favorites archive, had to comb my archived mail for poems sent to various siblings, parents or friends from the previous device.(Poetry Foundation discontinued use of User Profiles.  The app uses local storage per device) This is a poem I shared with my youngest brother, with a nod to our mutual enjoyment of playing Acrophobia.  (Alas, Acrophobia is no more. To enjoy similar experience, consider playing AcroChallenge or AcroFever)

Anagrammer

Peter Pereira

If you believe in the magic of language,

then Elvis really Lives

and Princess Diana foretold I end as car spin.

If you believe the letters themselves

contain a power within them,

then you understand

what makes outside tedious,

how desperation becomes a rope ends it.

The circular logic that allows senator to become treason,

and treason to become atoners.

That eleven plus two is twelve plus one,

and an admirer is also married.

That if you could just rearrange things the right way

you’d find your true life,

the right path, the answer to your questions:

you’d understand how the Titanic

turns into that ice tin,

and debit card becomes bad credit.

How listen is the same as silent,

and not one letter separates stained from sainted.

Peter Pereira, "Anagrammer" from What's Written on the Body (Copper Canyon Press, 2007). www.coppercanyonpress.org

Poetry Month: Day Twenty

An optimistic poem from an old quote journal, the jist of which reminds me of a particular twist ending in a novel I once read. The author had a particular character dangling over the abyss of death- it was the expected outcome. When she yanked the doomed character back onto life's shore, she used it as an opportunity  to illustrate the goodness of God; that sometimes the forecast for stormy weather is man's best guess without a measurable differential for God's grace in place. As the Bible has aptly put it: who knows?

Sometimes 

 Sheenagh Pugh 

Sometimes things don't go, after all,

from bad to worse.  Some years, muscadel

faces down frost; green thrives; the crops don't fail,

sometimes a man aims high, and all goes well.



A people sometimes will step back from war;

elect an honest man, decide they care

enough, that they can't leave some stranger poor.

Some men become what they were born for.



Sometimes our best efforts do not go

amiss, sometimes we do as we meant to.

The sun will sometimes melt a field of sorrow

that seemed hard frozen:  may it happen for you.

Poetry Month: Day Nineteen

A poem shared from my Poetry App list of favorites. If you don't have the app on your smart devices yet, what are you waiting for? Grab it from the link: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/mobile/ 

The Breather

Billy Collins

 

Just as in the horror movies

when someone discovers that the phone calls

are coming from inside the house

so too, I realized   

that our tender overlapping

has been taking place only inside me.

All that sweetness, the love and desire—

it’s just been me dialing myself

then following the ringing to another room

to find no one on the line,

well, sometimes a little breathing

but more often than not, nothing.

To think that all this time—

which would include the boat rides,

the airport embraces, and all the drinks—

it’s been only me and the two telephones,

the one on the wall in the kitchen

and the extension in the darkened guest room upstairs. 

The Breather from Espial Effects on Vimeo.

Poetry Month: Day Eighteen

A quote journal entry. I remember my dad teaching my brother and I how to float in a hotel pool once upon a family vacation long ago. He told us of swimming long distances as a Boy Scout and that, should we ever need to swim for miles and miles, the secret was in knowing how to float and rest along the way.

He went on to teach us that this same method can be applied in life's cold sea. We learned that survival comes not by thrashing aimlessly about but with faith that we are held and carried along.

First Lesson

Philip Booth 

Lie back, daughter, let your head


be tipped back in the cup of my hand.


Gently, and I will hold you. Spread


your arms wide, lie out on the stream


and look high at the gulls. A dead-


man's-float is face down. You will dive


and swim soon enough where this tidewater


ebbs to the sea. Daughter, believe


me, when you tire on the long thrash


to your island, lie up, and survive.


As you float now, where I held you


and let go, remember when fear


cramps your heart what I told you:


lie gently and wide to the light-year


stars, lie back, and the sea will hold you.

Poetry Month: Day Seventeen

A quote journal poem for Sunday.  As I re-read over my old journals, it is good to read the things I wanted to remind me.

Moderation Is Not A Negation of Intensity, But Helps Avoid Monotony 

John Tagliabue



Will you stop for a while, stop trying to pull yourself

     together

for some clear "meaning" - some momentary summary?

     no one

can have poetry or dances, prayers or climaxes all day;

     the ordinary

blankness of little dramatic consciousness is good for the

     health sometimes,

only Dostoevsky can be Dostoevskian at such long

     long tumultuous stretches;

look what that intensity did to poor great Van Gogh!;

     linger, lunge,

scrounge and be stupid, that doesn't take much centering

     of one's forces;

as wise Whitman said "lounge and invite the soul."  Get

     enough sleep;

and not only because (as Cocteau said) "poetry is the

     literature of sleep";

be a dumb bell for a few minutes at least; we don't want

     Sunday church bells

     ringing constantly.

Poetry Month: Day Sixteen

Today, Fisher will perform at the Asian Festival in Savannah. Here is a poem from my Poetry Foundation favorties for the day:

Ode on the Death of a Favourite Cat Drowned in a Tub of Goldfishes 

Thomas Gray

 

’Twas on a lofty vase’s side,

Where China’s gayest art had dyed

   The azure flowers that blow;

Demurest of the tabby kind,

The pensive Selima, reclined,

   Gazed on the lake below.

Her conscious tail her joy declared;

The fair round face, the snowy beard,

   The velvet of her paws,

Her coat, that with the tortoise vies,

Her ears of jet, and emerald eyes,

   She saw; and purred applause.

Still had she gazed; but ’midst the tide

Two angel forms were seen to glide,

   The genii of the stream;

Their scaly armour’s Tyrian hue

Through richest purple to the view

   Betrayed a golden gleam.

The hapless nymph with wonder saw;

A whisker first and then a claw,

   With many an ardent wish,

She stretched in vain to reach the prize.

What female heart can gold despise?

   What cat’s averse to fish?

Presumptuous maid! with looks intent

Again she stretch’d, again she bent,

   Nor knew the gulf between.

(Malignant Fate sat by, and smiled)

The slippery verge her feet beguiled,

   She tumbled headlong in.

Eight times emerging from the flood

She mewed to every watery god,

   Some speedy aid to send.

No dolphin came, no Nereid stirred;

Nor cruel Tom, nor Susan heard;

   A Favourite has no friend!

From hence, ye beauties, undeceived,

Know, one false step is ne’er retrieved,

   And be with caution bold.

Not all that tempts your wandering eyes

And heedless hearts, is lawful prize;

   Nor all that glisters, gold.

Poetry Month: Day Fifteen

From the quote journal archives, a poem that reflects my daily life -minus the need for a facial shave.

A Place For Everything

Louis Jenkins

 

It's so easy to lose track of things. A screwdriver, for

instance. "Where did I put that? I had it in my hand just a

minute ago." You wander vaguely from room to room,

having forgotten, by now, what you were looking for,

staring into the refrigerator, the bathroom mirror… "I

really could use a shave…"

Some objects seem to disappear immediately while others

never want to leave. Here is a small black plastic gizmo

with a serious demeanor that turns up regularly, like a

politician at public functions. It seems to be an "integral

part," a kind of switch with screw holes so that it can be

attached to something larger. Nobody knows what. This

thing's use has been forgotten but it looks so important

that no one is willing to throw it in the trash. It survives

by bluff, like certain insects that escape being eaten because

of their formidible appearance.

My father owned a large, three-bladed, brass propeller that

he saved for years. Its worth was obvious, it was just that it

lacked an immediate application since we didn't own a boat

and lived hundreds of miles from any large bodies of water.

The propeller survived all purges and cleanings, living, like

royalty, a life of lonely privilege, mounted high on the

garage wall.

From Just Above Water (Holy Cow! Press)

Poetry Month: Day Fourteen

Today's poem is jotted in an old quote journal because it seemed to be about me:

THE SAILOR

Geof Hewitt

In my movie the boat goes under

And he alone survives the night in the cold ocean,

Swimming he hopes in a shoreward direction.

Daylight and he's still afloat, pawing the water

And doesn't yet know he's only fifty feet from shore.

He goes under for what will be the last time

But only a few feet down scrapes bottom.

He's suddenly a changed man and half hops, half swims

The remaining distance, hauls himself waterlogged

Partway up the beach before collapsing into sleep.

As he dreams the tide comes in

And rolls him back to sea.

Poetry Month: Day Thirteen

Another quote journal quote for Poetry Month.  Do you have a secret life? Tell me- what do you keep there ? Enjoy this slightly scandalous selection by Stephen Dunn.

A Secret Life

Stephen Dunn 

Why you need to have one

is not much more mysterious than

why you don't say what you think

at the birth of an ugly baby.

Or, you've just made love

and feel you'd rather have been

in a dark booth where your partner

was nodding, whispering yes, yes,

you're brilliant. The secret life

begins early, is kept alive

by all that's unpopular

in you, all that you know

a Baptist, say, or some other

accountant would object to.

It becomes what you'd most protect

if the government said you can protect

one thing, all else is ours.

When you write late at night

it's like a small fire

in a clearing, it's what

radiates and what can hurt

if you get too close to it.

It's why your silence is a kind of truth.

Even when you speak to your best friend,

the one who'll never betray you,

you always leave out one thing;

a secret life is that important.

Poetry Month: Day Twelve

Uncle Charles will be buried today. The poem I share today comes from the Poetry Foundation's app. I mourn deeply our loss of Uncle Charles's wisdom; the silence where stories used to be.

An Intellectual’s Funeral  

Jonathan David  

On such a day we put him in a box 

And carried him to that last house, the grave;

All round the people walked upon the streets

Without once thinking that he had gone.

Their hard heels clacked upon the pavement stones.

A voiceless change had muted all his thoughts

To a deep significance we could not know;

And yet we knew that he knew all at last.

We heard with grave wonder the falling clods,

And with grave wonder met the loud day.

The night would come and day, but we had died.

With new green sod the melancholy gate

Was closed and locked, and we went pitiful.

Our clacking heels upon the pavement stones

Did knock and knock for Death to let us in.

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from The Fugitive, 1922

Poetry Month: Day Eleven

Funeral home visitation is today in Waycross. Family will gather and try to comfort one another throughout the necessary arrangements. Once the formality subsides and we've all tracked back down our separate paths, comfort may be sought in the souvenirs Charles left behind.

THE MAN EXPLAINS HIS SOUVENIRS

Charles Rafferty 

 

Twenty years ago, the skeleton  

of a wild pig gleamed among violets 

while the leaf rot around it 

grew hot with spring. I slipped 

the molar out of its grin like an oiled key 

and took it home, leaving the boar to reassemble, if it ever did,  

at a gap-toothed resurrection. I hold it up t

to show my daughters. They are less 

impressed each year. I have antlers  

and trilobites and chips of pretty bedrock 

from all the places where the sun came up 

to burn me awake with beauty—even 

a turtle shell we used as an ashtray 

in that first apartment, on the bank  

of a creek that flooded every March 

and took our trash to sea. All of it  

sleeps in a basement box—a kind of coffin  

for my former life, but also a proof

that I stooped to the world,  

that I kept what came my way.

Poetry Month: Day Ten

As we prepare to attend my uncle's viewing tomorrow, I am reminded of another Julia Kasdorf poem.



I have an actual tentative plan to go into grief counseling someday... whenever I  grow up... until then, this "weathering loss" serves as learning to sit quietly with those who weep.



Of all the things I've learned, I've been most surprised to realize that sometimes the weeping one is me.

What I Learned From My Mother  

 Julia Kasdorf

 

I learned from my mother how to love

the living, to have plenty of vases on hand

in case you have to rush to the hospital

with peonies cut from the lawn, black ants

still stuck to the buds. I learned to save jars

large enough to hold fruit salad for a whole

grieving household, to cube home-canned pears

and peaches, to slice through maroon grape skins

and flick out the sexual seeds with a knife point.

I learned to attend viewings even if I didn’t know

the deceased, to press the moist hands

of the living, to look in their eyes and offer

sympathy, as though I understood loss even then.

I learned that whatever we say means nothing,

what anyone will remember is that we came.

I learned to believe I had the power to ease

awful pains materially like an angel.

Like a doctor, I learned to create

from another’s suffering my own usefulness, and once

you know how to do this, you can never refuse.

To every house you enter, you must offer

healing: a chocolate cake you baked yourself,

the blessing of your voice, your chaste touch.

Reprinted from Sleeping Preacher, University of Pittsburgh Press, 1992, by permission of the publisher. 

First printed in West Branch, Vol. 30, 1992. Copyright © 1992 by Julia Kasdorf.

Source: Sleeping Preacher (University of Pittsburgh Press, 1992)

Poetry Month: Day Nine

Today, my Great Uncle Charles died. I really wish he could have stayed on...wish they all could.



He was a really good guy.



And now, we all draw near that old screened porch -which will never be the same again- to say fare-the-well...for now...until we meet again.



We share our grief, our loss. We recite the stories and share memories rehearsed a thousand times before. This time they are tributes.



I am listening to the stories as if I've never heard them before.

I am trying to remember them well.

For those who know all the best stories keep up and leaving the room. 

DYING WITH AMISH UNCLES

Julia Kasdorf

 The ground was frozen so hard

his sons used a jackhammer to pry

open a grave in the rocky field

where Grossdaadi's wife and daughter 

lay under the streaked stones

that tell only last names: 

Yoder, Zook, Yoder

Amish uncles, Grossdaadi's sons, 

shoveled earth on the box; 

stones clattered on wood then quieted

while we sang hymns to the wind. 

Bending over the hole, 

Uncle Kore wouldn't wipe

his dripping nose and chin. 

Ten years later when we gather

for July ham and moon pies, 

the uncles stand to sing

Grossdaadi's favorite hymns. 

At " Gott ist die Liebe," 

they almost laugh

with tears running 

into their beards; 

Abe and Mose and Ben 

do not wipe them. 

Their voices come deep as graves

and unashamed of shirtsleeves

or suspenders. Seeing them cry

that brave, I think the uncles 

mustn't die, that they'll stay

with those of us who must, 

being so much better than we are

at weathering death. 

 As I shared this poem with family tonight, I thought to look up the hymn mentioned in the poem. It led to an interesting documentary on life as a Hutterite and footage of a ninety year old granny singing old hymns - many of which we recognized. For a brief moment, an impromptu sing-a-long occurred--this borrowed granny, my parents and me.



I'll leave you to link hop at your leisure, but here is the poem's hymn for your convenience: