(Poems from my time in Cullowhee, NC)
December 13, 2014
I took the wrong turn –
or missed my turn –
but still reached the destination.
It’s easy to get all caught up
in structure and technique
when you are writing/reading prose –
but with poetry, anything can happen.
A friend – of a new friend,
and an old friend, and a distant relative,
and a classmate –introduced himself to me.
The world is so small.
And a homeless man sat at my table,
gathering change for a bus ticket
to Charlotte. I shook his extended hand,
but shushed him – it was during the poetry reading –
as any good librarian would.
Though I had no change,
I thanked him for his company.
There are plenty of gypsies
and monks – like me – in these hills.
And I am learning to love
their bending, curving,
never-ending ways –
they speak to the centripetal forces
already in my soul, and carve
a path of least resistance
through their mountain home.
about the poetry
The things that are
fleeting, passing,
require and inspire
the poetry –
if only a line or two –
a word, a note, a tune;
formless and shapeless,
though still finite,
words are needed/
heeded to mark the memory,
to fix the experience
in time.
The infinite –
is poetry itself –
like meter and rhythm –
cycles that appear
and recede like ripples
of waves that touch
the shores of our dreams
from opposing sides,
across expanses
of timeless and
boundless space.
The form of our finite lives
is also the poetry –
poetry that endures –
beyond the borders
that surround us –
the horizons that beckon us.
words
I love the Portuguese word –
concretizar –
to make concrete
a thing, anything,
that is abstract –
just seems to have
so many applications,
so many concrete applications,
to everyday life –
(though Mrs. Nimmo said
to never use a word
to define itself)
bet there are some
really good words
in German, too –
compound nouns and such –
but I never studied it.
English (original, from postcard poetry month, 2014)
through ordered words
that arise from a space within –
we push back the outer margins
of chaos, of disorder,
and preserve a world –
a separate world we choose –
that reflects our inner peace.
April 21, 2016
The thing,
the event that occurs,
and its depiction, later,
in literature,
is not always an identity,
mathematically speaking.
The latter may be
an aggregation or a product,
a derivative, or backwards,
a definite integral
of the original deed.
I struggle
with this poem’s identity:
mainstream; avant-garde;
quiet and contained;
a cup running over.
Thresher
I just learned the minimum time required
for human perception of an event:
fifty milliseconds for retinal
integration; 100 milliseconds
for cognitive integration. On board,
it all occurred too fast for awareness,
too quickly for human apprehension –
a tragedy befell us – a collapse
of moral order – it hit us so fast
we couldn’t integrate it with our eyes,
with streaming thoughts about our empty thoughts.
A poem, perhaps, condensed, distilled the track
of every hope – and woe – that passed too soon
for our perception – slow-motioned, closely read.
Life and politics on TV
life is so much more like
Parks and Recreation than
Madame Secretary.
So don’t get it twisted
when you pull the curtain.
Poetry is just streaming words –
nothing high brow about it –
painting is lines and shapes
splashed on canvas with a brush –
and dancing is shifting weight
from one foot to the other
in motion across a wooden floor.
If I were a strong wind I’d wrap
all around you – if a river,
I’d rise up to your knees –
if a song, I’d bounce tenderly
against your eardrums, until I
found my way into your inner heart.
More like Parks and Recreation,
less like Madame Secretary,
nothing like The Good Wife.
Life. Don’t get it twisted.
Unpacked
A migration,
a journey by moonlight,
from one sacred state
to another –
move fast though,
‘cause the night,
well-lit, is short,
which means no time
for reading signs and prayers
for good fortune on the road.
The shortest distance
between two points
is a straight line –
or a tesseract
for time travelers
among us.
Another year
won’t kill them,
and the cotton crop
demands their presence.
But this particular
convergence comes
once a generation,
so their next chance
will be less fortuitous –
as will ours.
A long day, a bright moon,
and a lost year.
And a journey
to bridge a gap in space.
Summer solstice
Sun Ra told us years ago the planet
was doomed – yet we believed,
deep inside, that our exceptionalism
and our privilege would pull us through
in the end – except it didn’t.
The doom we thought we’d avert
eventually consumed us, along
with everybody/everything else.
I had a large garden plot when I lived
in the mountains. Grew a row of sunflowers
from seed on the eastern border.
When they grew so tall with flowers
like crowns, I named each and called
them my ladies. Then one evening
in the valley of the lilies, we were visited
by a microburst – strange weather
in those mountains – and every tall thing
was leveled.
Each poem I write is about these things: love,
family, and poetry. There. You have the key.
No need to guess, I’ll tell you what’s up.
I can’t escape this destiny,
and I cannot hide my pen.
Mountain verse – December 3, 2014
I’ve been listening to a lot more
country music
since moving to the mountains
and I always underestimate
distances
because the path is never
as the crow flies –
but the skies are clear,
and the shortened days
are gorgeous,
and the sunsets –
over mountain peaks –
are unforgettable.
Mountain verse deux, December 3, 2014
I dreamed about my father
last night.
He was driving,
under the influence,
as usual,
searching for something,
some place he couldn’t find.
He used to go to the mountains,
him and his boys,
on Methodist Church retreats.
Always returned home
with a twinkle
in his eyes.
Maybe he found
what he was searching for
in these mountains.
Mountain verse – December 4, 2014
my childhood was marred, scarred,
terrorized, traumatized by images, visions
of the wicked witch of the west.
I’d only see her once a year
(this was before VHS, Beta, and DVD’s),
but memories of that flying bicycle,
that broomstick and that black dress and hat
would haunt me throughout the year.
Later I’d learn that witchcraft is
just cultural expression – and a black dress
is just a fashion statement – and a broomstick
is a symbol of a necessary occupation –
and secretly, secretly, secretly,
I always wanted that flying bicycle.
Mountain verse – December 5, 2014
politicians are race-baiting
pundits are race-blaming
police are race-fearing
people are losing the race –
as horrible as the narrative is,
it’s just a distraction, a diversion,
a misdirection of our attention –
the question that should haunt us all:
what is it that we should
really be paying attention to?
Mountain verse – December 13, 2014
I took the wrong turn –
or missed my turn –
but still reached the destination.
It’s easy to get all caught up
in structure and technique
when you are writing/
reading prose –
but with poetry, anything can happen.
A friend – of a new friend,
and an old friend,
and a distant relative,
and a classmate –
introduced himself
to me. The world is so small.
You’d better not mess up!
And a homeless man
sat at my table, gathering change
for a bus ticket to Charlotte.
I shook his extended hand,
but shushed him –
it was during the poetry reading –
as any good librarian would.
Though I had no change,
I thanked him for his company.
There are plenty of gypsies
and monks – like me –
in these hills. And I am learning to love
their bending, curving,
never-ending ways –
they speak to the centripetal forces
already in my soul,
and carve
a path of least resistance
through their mountain home.
January 5, 2015
if I had my way
these poems would all
be written/printed
on transparent paper –
or at least a translucent
medium.
But why, you ask?
To see through the page,
of course,
with the only obstruction
to pure view
being the printed word itself
after 2 years of sabbatical,
of self-reflection
and introspective thought,
of good and garbage poetry
regularly posted and blogged,
I am back to work –
but in a new world,
and making it newer –
and writing for work
is taking over all that free time
I used to have.
Prose is asserting itself
on me, but some poetry,
some verse
may yet leak out, spill over
on the sides.
February 11, 2015
March 28, 2015
This shyt is getting/becoming
more and more Nixonian
with each passing day.
Henchmen better
watch their six.
Only mystery is
which ones will go down
with the ship.
SMH.
Regrets on the lynching event.
Too busy.
Ooh! p.s. This is a poem.
April 1, 2015
the Reference Desk is oval
like a ship’s bridge –
I pace from right to left
peering out over an ocean
of information –
the waves of users lap the bow
then, peel, like ripples, away.
April 2, 2015
nothing has grown yet
in my one-week-old garden
I wonder will the little seeds
make it through early Spring’s late frost?
did I plant too soon?
was I over-anxious to begin?
I stick my finger in the ground –
it feels warm inside, underneath,
just half an inch deep where my seeds
rest – I think they will survive.
April 3, 2015
A deal was struck,
announced, applauded –
a conflict avoided,
for now, for the future
warmongers on the left
and on the right,
vanquished, silenced,
disarmed, for the present
reconciliation:
an elected leader deposed,
an embassy seized, occupied,
both wrong, both wronged –
and hope for a new balance,
a re-calibration –
possibility works well
as a bargaining chip.
April 4, 2015
a full blood moon shone high
over the eastern sky
two nights in a row –
the first night was cloudy,
hazy,
and the full moon
a little fuzzy
around the edges –
all day long,
we hit the regular haunts –
the places where we always eat
the stores we shop
seeing loved ones at home –
but there was an emptiness –
something was missing
in our normal circuit –
then, on the second night –
a clear night,
no clouds in the sky –
we saw it.
For a moment.
the emptiness
that was a shadow
moving between/among us –
lunar eclipse.
April 5, 2015
early spring is as colorful as late autumn:
the highway flora is putting on new clothes
winter’s browns and greys displaced by greens
and oranges and reds and purples –
further west, the road gets curvier and trees,
more hardwood that evergreen, more long-legged,
evergreens shorter, bushier –
the baby mountains start to appear,
along with their mothers and fathers –
majestic, protective, persevering –
I can feel my brain starting to bend
to the mountain curves. I switch the station
from talk radio to jazz. A Love Supreme
takes me all the way to my mountain home.
April 18, 2015
I arise early from a restless night –
dawn is not yet breaking – all is silent
save the occasional mournful tweet
of a single bird – same note, same tune
and no response – he doesn’t have a mate.
The mountain air is cool & crisp & still –
the darkest part of night.
I make coffee in the aeropress, sit
on the porch and listen to the sad song
of the solitary bird – and sip my coffee,
slowly, to the end. Soon dawn will break
the silence of the night – the dogwoods
blooming, the chorus streaming –
and the early bird will meet his happy maid.
April 19, 2015
the garden is my primary place
for meditation these days,
in these majestic mountains,
in this place of serenity and beauty
I inherit an abandoned plot –
weeds have overgrown
last year’s plantings
and perennials –
preparing the beds for planting
i dig up old carrot roots,
unfound potatoes, decomposing,
and sundry forms of organic life
I crumble the good earth
with my fingers – I feel
the power in the soil
to sustain a new growth
with a shovel and a rake
I turn the old soil over,
exposing its underside
to sunlight and fresh air
then sprinkle a little mulch
in the furrows that form –
spread the mixture slowly,
evenly, to form a flat bed
it’s like an open wound,
exposed, that heals quickly
with sunshine and oxygen –
it’s time to place the seeds –
I punch holes gently, gently
in the heaping, heaving mound
and drop two or three seeds
into each little womb, and wait . . .
weeds grow like, well, weeds,
and must be plucked, removed –
and on dry days there is watering –
& waiting & hoping
today’s meditation is complete –
my body is tired from digging,
raking, bending, touching the soil –
I’ll sleep like a baby tonight.
April 20, 2015
plucking those grey hairs
will not hold back
the inexorable flood of time –
they grow back faster and longer for a reason.
and we will get older
and more decrepit if we last,
and someday we will die.
these are the facts.
April 21, 2015 – poetic thought on the current Dyson/West kerfluffle
ghost stories can be very sad
when pain and hurt are just beneath
the superficial fright and scare –
we all know it ain’t about the storyline –
the plot is merely, purely incidental –
that the real game being played
is that we all got played
but hey, it’s cool –
as Mahalia would say, “that’s just
the way it is down here.”
you can be a tool
in the great game of 2016 –
but don’t be no fool,
‘cause poetry will find you out.
every shade of green – May 1, 2015
every shade of green, it seems,
displays itself upon the hills
that fill the skies encircling my home –
when I arrived December’s days
were short, its nights were long –
these hills were grey and brown –
and sad, a bit, but I was told
that green, in Spring, would overtake,
outstrip Winter’s darkness, and the hills
would put on green – from the bottom
to the top – in stages and layers –
like stockings, thick socks for a frosty night.
and so, in streaks and patches to the top,
100 shades of green now fill the skies.
gardening – June 2, 2015
gardening has given me
a different relationship
with the environment
than what I had before –
weather, mainly.
I fret a bit when it’s been dry –
and I worry when it rains
too long or too hard
or too frequently –
weeds are so much more adaptable –
and I have seeds in the ground,
and skin in the game.
gardening II – June 4, 2015
all my verse is about gardening
these days, the rains that feed,
the weeds that choke (which is
their right to do), the late frost
that kills the tender shoots from seeds
I planted too early.
my sunflowers are quite the ladies,
bashful, tender, as they approach
their flowering stage, the carrots
need more thinning, their tops
the brightest green, and the turnip
leaves too tough to eat.
but one of the weeds has edible
leaves – I’ll think I’ll let it grow.
June 20, 2015
another gardening poem – June 26, 2015
we are
the invasive species.
Like weeds,
our broad green leaves
block out sunlight
to the seeded plants –
our well-adapted root system
drains away nutrients
from below.
we think
we are the fittest
for survival –
the quickest to adjust
to environmental shifts,
and yet the most
conservative
to superficial change.
we create
thoughts, make decisions
to ensure security
for our progeny –
they will belong
in the garden –
and they will
cover up our
alien origins.
July in the Valley of the Lilies
mountain morning
birds tweeting
thick mist hiding the hilltops –
arrive at work @ 8
coffee on the esplanade
bright sun on our faces…
from above and below
…work calling us –
but we’d much rather
make small talk about Faulkner
Lunch in the Valley
Tuck’s Tap and Grill was playing
Norah Jones back to back –
don’t know why I didn’t come.
I was drinking my favorite –
iced tea, half sweetened,
half not, with lemon –
had a Santa Fe burger, medium,
with sweet potato fries.
The waitress was very kind
and understood my need
for half and half –
just finished her associate degree
at Southwestern Community College –
be at Western in the fall.
#ThisIsMyPoetryBlog 