Hello, there. The others are at the back, oddly quiet tonight. Poets! All moody and going on and on about emotion and the human condition.
Well, you know the rules. If you’re only popping in to badger Eugene, off you go. If you are earnestly interested in the poetry discussion, want something to chew on and don’t mind a few hip and hobbity trolls who like to bandy about, who will freely comment as often as they like, who may have an actual sense of humour and and who believe in the ART of poetry, then seat yourself.
(We do not count comments in the pub. And comments do not have to stay on topic, as long as respect is shown. No eye poking, beard pulling, slap and tickle or insult slinging. Also, no cunningly disguised free verse attacks or out-and-out anti-publication cattiness. However, chummy teasing is --- of course --- allowed, even encouraged. My bouncers are lazy, but they are very big.)
So, let me know if you liked anything at all about any of the poems that are being shared tonight. It’s a buffet tonight. Tuck in. There’s more to come...
(****all poems are being posted here for study and review purposes only and will be removed from this blog in the very near future.**** )
PS-- sorry about the odd line spacing! Grrrr...
If you want an example of patience
by Casey Patrick
imagine drowning, or
the desert’s thirsty ground.
The Penelopes of history, every Aegeus
throwing a stone down an empty well.
The whole idea of fishing. The fact of glue and tape.
Any of these will do.
A mirror. A beetle. God
or whatever’s out there kicking its small legs.
Or a three-year-old trying to sit still for a lifetime of
five minutes.
That work. Lucifer chained to a lake of fire.
The first time anyone heard that. How long they
imagined
they could stand it.
Don’t forget your mother
and how you’ve grown to resemble her. Consider
the infinite groping of tongues,
how many languages there are to get through.
And our hands. And our teeth. Our skin.
The heart with no murmur. The eye
with the right balance of moisture, not too dry. It
seems
we are endlessly patient, then.
The countdown to the explosion.
The slow work of aiming. Shining our flashlights
at night that swallows
our callused feet. And our skulls,
fusing by age two. The way we love someone
from a distance. And the way love rips out
the seams of us, stitch by stitch in the night.
http://composejournal.com/articles/want-example-patience/
Caritas
by Rachael Boast
(St Andrews Cathedral)
These stones speak a level language
murmured word by word
a speech pocked and porous with loss
and the slow hungers of weathering.
And there, in the broken choir, children
are all raised voice, loving the play of outline
and absence where the dissembled god
has shared his shape and homed us.
At the end of the nave, the east front stands
both altered and unchanged,
its arch like a glottal stop.
And what comes across, half-said
into all that space, is that it’s enough
to love the air we move through.
http://www.griffinpoetryprize.com/caritas/
Unlike objects, two stories can occupy the same space
By Charles Peek
Out along the last curve in the brick walk
the grass has begun to green,
with the freezing cold and coming snow
its certain fate.
The cranes make the same mistake,
fields of red capped heads attest their arrival
just before the worst blizzard of winter
makes it impossible to tell the field from the river.
And we, too, have known these mortal mishaps,
miscalculated our time, found ourselves out of step,
arriving too early, staying on too late,
misjudging the nearness, the vengeance of the storm.
The cranes, the grass, they tell us:
this can go on for millions of years.
Grief
By Barbara Crooker
is a river you wade in until you get to the other side.
But I am here, stuck in the middle, water parting
around my ankles, moving downstream
over the flat rocks. I'm not able to lift a foot,
move on. Instead, I'm going to stay here
in the shallows with my sorrow, nurture it
like a cranky baby, rock it in my arms.
I don't want it to grow up, go to school, get married.
It's mine. Yes, the October sunlight wraps me
in its yellow shawl, and the air is sweet
as a golden Tokay. On the other side,
there are apples, grapes, walnuts,
and the rocks are warm from the sun.
But I'm going to stand here,
growing colder, until every inch
of my skin is numb. I can't cross over.
Then you really will be gone.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/88766
**************edit*****************
Because this poem spoke to so many, I decided to read more of Barbara Crooker's poetry and found a poem called, "Demeter," which shares her anguish at losing her daughter to a head injury that sent her into a coma. She developed pneumonia and died. It is almost as though the two pieces belong together (and I wonder if they do so in her book. She's written several. I've decided to add a link to the poem)
Reading the two together is heartwrenching.
_____________________
*****Edit*****
I decided to add one of my own, published this winter in the Prairie Journal (Issue 67). Ruben had commented he liked the idea of going gung-ho on a subject, a concentrated focus. I'd seen this approach to poetry and decided to try it on the theme of colour blindness. I enjoyed the single-mindedness so much that I will do this again. I encourage you to give it a go, yourself!
Taupe Fireworks and Anemic Kaleidoscopes
By Cyndi MacMillan
Deuteranopia: a red/green colour vision deficiency
which can interfere with the ability to recognize the colours
red, green, purple, gray and some turquoise hues.
Winter cardinals wear plainest trench coats.
Every jade Buddha is recast as bone.
Monet’s lilies float their driftwood pads
upon sandstone waters.
Pasty balloons announce the birth of daughters.
A red stoplight glows frigid cinders
while eggshell-ivy twines
upon oatmeal bricks.
Unseen, the green fairy in the cup —
absinthe ferments into Swedish bitters.
Grapes ripen, become sweet, granite clusters.
Volcanos erupt such drab, beige heat.
A prick of the finger bleeds liquescent cardboard
and lipstick dimly marks you with a khaki kiss.
All Christmas wreaths: wheat or ecru.
Each Valentines: doilies and concrete.