to not add a last line

god fugitive: a bosom friend outfit.  no, not that kind of bosom.

i'm on the downswing after the debut of god fugitive: a bosom friend.  

accomplished nothing yesterday.

today i hope to work on my essay on O, for dialogue's pink issue.  i hope it works out.

i also need to work on a stupid little thing called laundry, teach my online class, and get together an email list to invite people to my reading next friday.

spend some quality time with my children, who have been neglected for the past week.

figure out something fun to do for date night.

last night i did readings for a 9/11 memorial recital.  i feel weird about 9/11 memorial stuff that happens outside of nyc.  the recitalist chose the readings, but asked me to add one to it, so i did.  and that was tough, too.  i was trying to avoid anything that would have weird connotations in the context of the music and video feed that went with the readings.  

turns out everything has weird connotations in that context.  but, score one for poetry!  the recitalist told me that when she sent in the texts to the people making the programs, the whole office stopped to read this poem. 

so haters who hate poetry, take that, and read this.

Photograph from September 11

WISŁAWA SZYMBORSKA

They jumped from the burning floors—

one, two, a few more,

higher, lower.

The photograph halted them in life,

and now keeps them   

above the earth toward the earth.

Each is still complete,

with a particular face

and blood well hidden.

There’s enough time

for hair to come loose,

for keys and coins

to fall from pockets.

They’re still within the air’s reach,

within the compass of places

that have just now opened.

I can do only two things for them—

describe this flight

and not add a last line.

hearts

heart dress, heart earrings.

valentine outfit

i'm a valentine's day grinch.  in the tradition of julie, i'm practicing a more positive attitude about this dreaded holiday and embracing hearts.  

i gave cecily these earrings for valentine's day this morning, then immediately borrowed them.  

sorry, cecily.

kork-ease mary janes.  i didn't check the heel height when i ordered them online.  i'm a giantess in these heels.

if there's one thing i can't get enough of in a shoe it's a) red and b) mary janes. i have to stop myself from buying more red and more mary janes, trying to diversify my footwear.  

my tights are looking the worse for wear, but i don't want to invest in new ones at season's end.  


valentine recipe

molten lava cake.

i know this cake is a cliche, but i make it almost every year.  it's so easy and, if you're a human being, you'll love it.  i used paula deen's recipe, minus the orange liquer because i'm not a fan of orange and chocolate together.  i also added a pinch of salt.  

i always add an extra pinch of salt to every dessert. try it!


valentine date

george bernard shaw's pygmalion at provo's echo theatre.

pygmalion at the new community theatre in provo, the echo theatre.  my first show at the echo.  can't wait to check it out. 

and i've never seen a production of pygmalion before.  


valentine poem



tons of love poems at the poetry foundation.  if you want to get your feet wet with poetry, their website is the perfect place to explore.

A un Desconocido

BY LORNA DEE CERVANTES

I was looking for your hair,

black as old lava on an island   

of white coral. I dreamed it   

deserted you and came for me,   

wrapped me in its funeral ribbons   

and tied me a bow of salt.

Here’s where I put my demise:   

desiring fire in a web of tide,   

marrying the smell of wet ashes   

to the sweet desert of your slate.

My intelligent mammal, male

of my species, twin sun to a world   

not of my making, you reduce me   

to the syrup of the moon, you boil   

my bones in the absence of hands.

Where is your skin, parting me?

Where is the cowlick under your kiss   

teasing into purple valleys? Where   

are your wings, the imaginary tail

and its exercise? Where would I breed   

you? In the neck of my secret heart   

where you’ll go to the warmth of me   

biting into that bread where crumbs crack   

and scatter and feed us our souls;

if only you were a stone I could   

throw, if only I could have you.

ladies, step up and out!

i always love these twenties flapper shoes like grandma eva wore

yesterday i wore tights for the first time since last spring.

i pulled on a pair of last season's tights (cranberry colored) under a dress that is now three seasons old--a grey sort of shift type thing that has seen better days.

i had two simultaneous thoughts:  1) i'm not ready for tights! and 2) i miss blogging.

i thought about starting a brand new blog--and why not?  

it still might happen.

but at least for today, i'll stick with the trusty old girls in tights blog.

it's gloomy out today, in a beautiful way, and the mountains are just barely turning their fall colors.  at the advice of my daughter, i wrapped in a quilt and sat on the back porch in the middle of the day and just looked at the mountains.  she told me to say out loud, "there is a rhythm and flow to life, and i am part of it."  i did what she told me to do, and it made me feel a lot better.

did i mention the part where i was feeling super crappy today?  

well, no one wants to hear about that old thing.

but, i was having a bit of a melt down.  

the kind that a daughter shouldn't have to witness in her trusty ol' mother, but she got me through it.  

so one thing i can't feel crappy about today is my wise daughter.  

and all the wise ladies i know.

i had already reached out to my baby sister.  actually, i was about to call her when she called me instead.  she always makes me feel better.

as i thought about who i could turn to for support, so many women came to mind.  

it's a stale line, but it's true.  and until i come up with a fresh line, i'll just have to use this one again:

i feel so grateful for the amazing women in my life.  

the lack i was feeling today began to fill with daughters, sisters, aunts, and mothers. 

i simply can't wallow in the face of such feminine, goddessy richness.

***

there's a lot of lady times stuff going down in my neck of the woods:

1) the ordain women action taking place a week from saturday.  a lot of hateful chatter is darkening the internets right now, relating to the ordination discussion.  this makes me sad.  but it also shows that this topic needs addressing.  by everyone.  no matter what your opinion is on the subject.  if someone in our midst wants to talk.  if anyone in our midst wants to talk, of high or low profile, of any walk of life or "worthiness" as determined by our ill-bestowed judgements about other folks's moral purity, it is our sacred duty and obligation to listen and respond with thoughtful, kind, and sincere reply.

my other wise daughter, ingrid, who has actual professional training in direct action, told me something like, "it's a really bad sign when you get NO reaction to your work.  it's a better sign if you get a lot of blowback."  so, i'm hoping the discussion will continue, but that it will get smarter, more nuanced, and more productive.  i hope with every fiber of my being  (that's more utah church-speak, in case you're not familiar) that shaming, judging, and name-calling will have no part in mormon sisterhood.  that behavior is shameful and harmful to us all, as a self-proclaimed body of christ.

if we're gonna talk that much talk, mormon people, we better get right on up and walk the walk.  i'm not seeing that happening right now.

i have many feelings on this ordination subject, but i still haven't figured out the right time and place and way and venue to talk about them.  i don't even know exactly what i want to say.  

sadly, i don't feel all that safe discussing these things in a public forum, and i'm pretty sure i'm not the only one.  

in the meantime, this is the most important thing to me right now, and the thing i feel most sure about:

mormon ladies, give your sisters a safe place to talk.  if we don't feel safe airing our questions, doubts, struggles, etc. in the sistership of church, then where?  i've known too many women, starting from the time i was thirteen years old, who leftthefold (that's mo-speak, too) because they were judged, shamed or criticized for having the wrong something or other:  skirt length, body type, mannerism, make-up, piercings, marital status, economic status, job or not job, number of children or not children, visual aids, boob job or not boob job, level of household cleanliness, enforcement of dress and grooming standards in offspring, attendance at movies of a certain rating, sexuality, etc.  i've even heard, on a few occasions, horrible, disgusting name calling and labeling at church.  i can't ever forget that, and it makes me not want to speak out even when i know i should.  

it's truly sick.  and not sick as in "rad", sick as in super twisted and wrong. this is a terrible "tradition of our fathers (i.e. mothers)", and we sisters are fostering and continuing it. it makes no sense for us not to be, instead: 


a fluffy bed of down 

or a green pasture for anyone 

who is hurting or questioning to lie down in, 

to rest and repose in

a cool drink of water on a hot day


and i don't mean in the sense that 

"oh, ladies are so much better at empathizing with folks than non-ladies."

i mean it in this way:  ladies need to take a leadership role in making our community a kinder, more open, more transparent, more welcoming, accepting, and safer place.  

and not because we're ladies, but because someone better do it.  why not us?  why not now?

from what i'm witnessing in my daily and weekly church interactions, in the heart of the sometimes twisted heart of the bosom of mormondom that is utah county, there's a crisis looming. we'd better do something fast.  

sister claudia bushman has said in my presence, at least a half dozen times, "the mormon church is a hierarchy, and women can't climb that ladder.  you have to make lateral space for yourself." 

i've never know how to interpret that exactly, but since sister claudia bushman said it, i keep on trying to figure out how to implement her wisdom in my life.  and i figure that making safer, more open spaces for discussion is, for sure, a lateral move, in the best sense.

let's show everyone we know how to talk in a smarter and nicer way.  

this might sound too optimistic, but i honestly think we can create a sea-change in the way dialogue happens in our church, community, culture, neighborhoods, and families.  regardless of where you fall on this issue, what possible harm is there in trying to understand someone else's point of view or feelings?  can empathetic listening ever be a bad thing?  let's change some of the negative actions we sometimes unwittingly adhere to, those unexamined traditions around our "duty" to condemn those we disagree with.  this is a practice that is purely cultural, and can be discarded without a second thought.  it does no practical or spiritual good to anyone.  and we don't need any one of authority to tell us this is the right thing to do.  we already know it. we've known it for years.  we just haven't practiced it widely or well enough.

warm, and with a nod to sherwood forest

2) i'm reading for my ph.d exams scheduled for december 5th.  this has been one of the most exhilarating and enjoyable things i've ever done in my life.  i've never felt so focused or invigorated by my daily work.  it feels like a miracle that i have ten more weeks to revel in poetry.

my google drive is now cluttered with empty folders and documents of new creative and scholarly work i want to do as a result of my reading.   i vowed not to start new projects until after my exams, so i now just entitle empty documents so i can come back to them if they endure the length of my reading months.  

my mantra for the past few months has been, "focus on finishing."  everyone in my life keeps warning me not to start anything new.  i tend to chicken out on the  finishing part of things.  i'm working on that.  

so i got a little off the gender topic there.  what i was going to say is that i'm reading, of course, tons of gender theory, but also my favorite writers, like sappho, harryette mullen, and emily dickinson, to name a very few, and one of the themes of my reading list is gender performance. i'm trying to figure all that out by december 5th.  

but one thing that has really impressed me, though, beyond a shadow of a doubt, as we say in utah church speak, is that more female voices in the world equals a better world.  in fact, more voices from any where we're not hearing from, or hearing enough from, improves the world.  more voices do not diminish the ones already out there, despite the defensive posture human beings almost ALWAYS take when they feel their territory threatened.  a plurality of voices can co-exist.  

can be beautiful.  

we should try it out. 

more lady poets doesn't diminish the work of gentlemen poets.  

more ladies asking questions about the status quo doesn't hurt a thing.  

does it?  if you disagree, tell me, and i'll do my best to listen with an open mind and a soft heart.

but you would think, given some of the over-the-top responses to ladies' questions that i've seen lately, that lady questions are the scariest thing in the entire world.

i would say, not to put too fine a point on it, that questions 

are always the thing that saves the world, 

and right now, 

it seems like we might need a last-minute save.  

who's gonna step up in her milan 2013 fall leg wear?

who's gonna step up? 

ladies?  are we?

i'll leave you with these two poem thoughts, from emily dickinson and harryette mullen, and an urging for us all to pipe down and listen up, 

lest we miss the best and quietest sounds:

I was a Phoebe — nothing more —
A Phoebe — nothing less —
The little note that others dropt
I fitted into place —

I dwelt too low that any seek —
Too shy, that any blame —
A Phoebe makes a little print
Upon the Floors of Fame —

--Emily Dickinson, Poem 1009

Elliptical

BY HARRYETTE MULLEN

They just can’t seem to . . . They should try harder to . . . They ought to be more . . . We all wish they weren’t so . . . They never . . . They always . . . Sometimes they . . . Once in a while they . . . However it is obvious that they . . . Their overall tendency has been . . . The consequences of which have been . . . They don’t appear to understand that . . . If only they would make an effort to . . . But we know how difficult it is for them to . . . Many of them remain unaware of . . . Some who should know better simply refuse to . . . Of course, their perspective has been limited by . . . On the other hand, they obviously feel entitled to . . . Certainly we can’t forget that they . . . Nor can it be denied that they . . . We know that this has had an enormous impact on their . . . Nevertheless their behavior strikes us as . . . Our interactions unfortunately have been . . .

schadenfreude: 10 poets who are more flagrantly irresponsible/off balance than girl in tights

watermelon picnic basket carrying work lunch=a toothy smile in a tight day

girl in tight place,

nestled, snuggled, firmly ensconced

or, on some (ummm, many?) days, tightly wedged

& stuck

in the crevice of the bourgeousie

& in a place 

where the college loans, credit card debt,

mortgage payment, lawn care, house renovation mania (in which i refuse/am unable to participate),

& the hoards of seemingly perfect children

who are neatly groomed & consistently do all their homework

close in on me

like the walls of the giant garbage compactor in star wars episode IV: a new hope

that almost crushes luke, leia, han solo, and chewy.

like last night,

around 2 a.m.

i'm lying on the couch

wide awake

alternating between plans

to become a more fit citizen of such a neighborhood

& a way to get a jet pack to blast the hell outta here.

call it schadenfruede, call it cold comfort, but it makes me

feel a little better to know there were (& are) poets who were even worse

than i at managing the details of life, who screwed up &

acted like bigger douchebags than me--as if my floundering

& haplessness might be a sign of genius,

as if majorly screwing up, as if profligacy, could make one

a poetic genius

(fallacy: ad hoc, ergo propter hoc).

as in: it could be worse.  as if, through juxtaposition,

i could look real good.

check these folks out, and congratulate yourself for your good behavior or
decide that maybe your bad behavior can be forgiven (unless otherwise noted, the link on the 
poet's name will take you to the website the italicized quote is taken from):

1.  christopher smart 

In spite of having a wife and family to support, Smart continued as thriftless as ever in the 1750s, spending freely on clothes and entertainment and borrowing from Newbery when he got into difficulties. Hunter describes him as "friendly, affectionate, and liberal to excess," but so regardless of practicalities that according to his wife he often invited company to dinner when there was not enough in the house to provide a meal even for themselves.

2. anne sexton

one of my favorite poets, i'm hesitant to say that mental illness is bad behavior, but who knows where on the continuum of drug abuse, personal betrayal, & instablility the responsibility for her actions lies.  here's a an exceprt from her bio at modern poetry that's a little salacious:   

Estranged from many of her former friends, Sexton became difficult for her maturing daughters to deal with. Aware that many of her readers did not like the religious poetry that she had recently begun writing with her more personal themes, Sexton became nervous about her poetry. Readings had always terrified her, but now she employed a rock group to back up her performances. She forced herself to be an entertainer, while her poems grew more and more privately sacral. In 1972 she published The Book of Folly and, in 1974, the ominously titled The Death Notebooks. Later that year, she completed The Awful Rowing toward God, published posthumously in 1975. Divorced and living by herself, Sexton was lonely and seemed to be searching for compassion through love affairs. She continued to be in psychotherapy, from which she evidently gained little solace. In October 1974, after having lunched with Maxine Kumin, Sexton asphyxiated herself with carbon monoxide in her garage in Boston.

3.  allen ginsberg 

so obvious i hardly need to put him on the list, but here's a tidbit i didn't know before today, when i began seeking information on the foibles of others in order to soothe myself:


Known for their unconventional views, and frequently rambunctious behavior, Ginsberg and his friends also experimented with drugs. On one occasion, Ginsberg used his college dorm room to store stolen goods acquired by an acquaintance. Faced with prosecution, Ginsberg decided to plead insanity and subsequently spent several months in a mental institution.

4.  ezra pound 

duh.

the new york times puts it mildly in this article about poetry magazine  & pound's relationship with the editor of poetry, harriet monroe:

Pound kept badgering Monroe over the years, while she indulged his bad temper and seemingly limitless capacity for self-pity. Before long, he was living in Rapallo and praising Fascists, and his letters appear less frequently and then vanish as he disappeared into propaganda and madness. But before he turned political, Pound was poetry's No. 1 nut, and when he leaves the pages of ''Dear Editor,'' much of the fun does, too. 

5. derek walcott

i wanted to study with him as an undergraduate.  the gossip pegs him as a philanderer, and in my own investigation, a playwright friend of mine who studied with him apparently did not get sexually harrassed by him, but did tell me the following, "he was always drunk.  and he has a.d.d.  so i learned a lot from him because i had to work so hard to keep his attention.  the minute he got bored he would quit reading your work and giving you feedback."

remember the 2002 scandal about him, wherein two poets behaved badly, the little "contretemps" between ruth padel and derek walcott?  here's a little excerpt from the guardian article:

There is something a bit grubby and commercial in Walcott's behaviour, certainly according to the claims made against him, in the 80s and 90s, that the grades he gave reflected the fact he'd been sexually rejected, in the first instance, and in the second, that he wanted sex in return for help producing a play. You'd want a poet to have more soul, wouldn't you? Sure, fall in love with a student, the heart wants what it wants – the poet's heart (I guess) doubly so. But don't measure out your love in half-hours and end-of-term grades. What would TS Eliot say?

 6. lord byron

In June 1813 Byron began an affair with his twenty-nine-year-old half sister, Augusta. Married since 1807 to her spendthrift cousin, Colonel George Leigh, she had three daughters and lived at Six Mile Bottom, near Cambridge. With his mother’s death in 1811, Augusta became Byron’s sole remaining close relative, a situation which doubtless increased his sense of identity with her. While no legal proof exists, the circumstantial evidence in Byron’s letters dating from August 1813 to his horrified confidante Lady Melbourne strongly suggests an incestuous connection with Augusta.

In the midst of this relationship, Byron received a letter from Annabella Milbanke, who confessed her mistake in rejecting his proposal and cautiously sought to renew their friendship. Correspondence ensued. He later wrote Lady Melbourne that Augusta wished him "much to marry—because it was the only chance of redemption for two persons."

7. samuel taylor coleridge

from wikipedia

Dorothy Wordsworth was shocked at his condition upon his return. From 1807 to 1808, Coleridge returned to Malta and then travelled in Sicily and Italy, in the hope that leaving Britain's damp climate would improve his health and thus enable him to reduce his consumption of opium. Thomas de Quincey alleges in his Recollections of the Lakes and the Lake Poets that it was during this period that Coleridge became a full-blown opium addict, using the drug as a substitute for the lost vigour and creativity of his youth. It has been suggested, however, that this reflects de Quincey's own experiences more than Coleridge's.
 
His opium addiction (he was using as much as two quarts of laudanum a week) now began to take over his life: he separated from his wife Sarah in 1808, quarrelled with Wordsworth in 1810, lost part of his annuity in 1811, and put himself under the care of Dr. Daniel in 1814.

8. sylvia plath


i can scarce bring myself to add her to the list as her behavior is not so much "bad" as the behavior of one severely, fatally afflicted by mental illness.  her suicide during her children's nap time leads one to believe that the woman had truly run out of hope, options, and her last ounce of strength.

nonetheless, i think about her when times get tough.  a troubled life can also contain transcendent goodness and beauty.  the exploration of darkness can also guide us to the light.


9.  charles bukowski

from the poetry foundation:

Ending up near death in Los Angeles, Bukowski started writing again, though he would continue to drink and cultivate his reputation as a hard-living poet.

&

“Published by small, underground presses and ephemeral mimeographed little magazines,” described Jay Dougherty in Contemporary Novelists, “Bukowski has gained popularity, in a sense, through word of mouth.” “The main character in his poems and short stories, which are largely autobiographical, is usually a down-and-out writer [Henry Chinaski] who spends his time working at marginal jobs (and getting fired from them), getting drunk and making love with a succession of bimbos and floozies,” related Ciotti. “Otherwise, he hangs out with fellow losers—whores, pimps, alcoholics, drifters.”


10. George Crabbe

from wikipedia

He continued to rack up debts that he had no way of paying, and his creditors pressed him. He later told Walter Scott and John Gibson Lockhart that "during many months when he was toiling in early life in London he hardly ever tasted butchermeat except on a Sunday, when he dined usually with a tradesman's family, and thought their leg of mutton, baked in the pan, the perfection of luxury." In early 1781 he wrote a letter to Edmund Burke asking for help, in which he included samples of his poetry. Burke was swayed by Crabbe's letter and a subsequent meeting with him, giving him a gift of money to relieve his immediate wants, and assuring him that he would do all in his power to further Crabbe's literary career. Among the samples that Crabbe had sent to Burke were pieces of his poems The Library and The Village.^[15][16]

A short time after their first meeting Burke told his friend Sir Joshua Reynolds that he had "the mind and feelings of a gentleman." Burke gave Crabbe the footing of a friend, admitting him to his family circle at Beaconsfield. There he was given an apartment, supplied with books, and made a member of the family. The time he spent with Burke and his family helped in enlarging his knowledge and ideas, and introducing him to many new and valuable friends including Charles James Fox and Samuel Johnson. He completed his unfinished poems and revised others with the help Burke's criticism. Burke helped him have his poem, The Library, published anonymously in June 1781, by a publisher that had previously refused some of his work. The Library was greeted with a small amount of praise from critics, and only slight public appreciation.^[17]

 
 a few questions arise from the very preliminary research i did today for this post, thinking about the poets who were gamblers, addicts, insane, philanderers, divas, narcissists, & fools:

1) where are all the bad girl poets?

2) why do the biographers of more than half of the ten poets listed attribute the emotional instability of the poet's mother as a factor in that poet's subsequent bad behavior?  (plath's problems are famously attributed to her father, but ultimately rest on her mother who was too weak to protect her.)

3) i know this question is sort of passé, but does the poet seek trouble as artistic material or does the troubled being seek art as transcendence from a troubled life?

4) there must be a million other cool, badly behavaed poets out there.  who are they, and what did they do?

legwear: black lace leggings à la madonna circa 1983 (see picture above)

inspired by: poetic output in the midst of starvation, abuse, depression, and illness


looking forward to:  performance with lalage at muse music tonight

the list & pink tights

lalage in seattle--tomorrow night, provo.  wish my pink tights were still alive.

all this talk of lists got me writing this prompt for my wednesday guest spot at book balloon:

(if you've missed the other prompts, let the table speak is here and a missive, a supplication is here.)

No method is better at reminding the poet of the power of juxtaposition and letting the white space do the talking than the list (also known as the catalogue) poem.  No method is better at freeing you from the constraint or pressure of forcing unity into your poem, something those of us trained on the sonnet might feel from time to time. 

It’s also one of my favorites for getting out of a rut, which maybe a few of us are feeling after a month of trying to keep up with all this intense thinkin’ and poetry writin’.  Try a list poem to get yourself over the mid-national poetry month hump:  when it’s too hard to make the connections, leave them out.  If you’ve been thinking too hard, stop.  The list can be spontaneous, absurd, profound, funny, lyrical or, in its best incarnation, all of those things at once.

*

I keep a lot of lists—and my lists are so far flung and various that it’s almost absurd.  Here’s an actual list I found from an old notebook eight years ago when I had a baby with respiratory illness and was working on Ph.d, teaching, raising 3 older children, feeding a vegetarian teen, buying a house, trying to write and publish a book of poetry, and basically juggling a lot of different sizes and shapes of balls:

1)    Order more tender grips from IHC.
2)    Make baba ganoush.
3)    Find copy of out of print Spicer book.
4)    Write Baudelaire paper.
5)    L’s reading assessment appointment.
6)    Buy dry erase markers.
7)    Find phone charger.
8)    Change oil.
9)    Soup to Grandma Beth.
10)    Write Daniel’s grant.

That list isn’t particularly poignant or profound, funny, absurd, or lyrical on it’s own, but if I fleshed it out just a tiny bit more for you, it would be.

Here’s a list poem I wrote in the early ‘90’s.  I’m only sharing it with you to show you an example of the poem, not because I’m particularly proud of it (though it has some okay moments):

I Will Write Ten Poems About What Happened to Me in Prison

I rested my cheek against a cool bar.

I dreamt of my scented mother, her sweet warm milk fed to me with a breast slipped
between the bars of my prison.  I was saddened to think the bars might chill her.

I quietly, embarrassingly, crying all the while, used the toilet.

I designed a gown that was later actualized by Donna Karan.

I pretended my enclosure was a crib for babies, and that I would soon be lifted from it.

Out of hunger, fear, and compulsiveness, I ate the inside of my mouth.

I asked that all bullets fired at 10:57 turn toward me, enter me like they were all my man, and release me at once from my body, far worse than any jail.

I vowed to become more ladylike.

I questioned my former disregard of Catholic mysticism.

My body kept telling me to run, but my mind quietly insisted that I stay put.

*

If you really want a catalogue tour de force, invest 20 minutes and read Christopher Smart’s Jubilate Agno.  (that link I trust a bit more because it's from poetry foundation, but this link has the full text and gives a better sense of the list/repetitive qualities of the poem.) Holy crap, it’s good & pretty crazy under the surface.  Notice the repetition at each line’s beginning and then the long shifts from “bless” to “praise” to “rejoice”.

The list poem can be a lot of things, and ideally, all things exist and co-exist without any need to justify, explain, or force a monolithic meaning out of the beautiful and absurd disparity that makes up a human life.  So don’t force—flow. 

Here are a few lists you might try making into poems.  Bon chance!

1)    grocery list
2)    imperative list—second person
3)    list of books
4)    to do list
5)    “I will. . .” list
6)    a list of favorite dresses, actors, plays, shoes, etc.
7)    a list of medications
8)    list of things you love/hate about____________
9)    a list of America
10)  a list of ten things you see from wherever it is you’re sitting



legwear:  grey herringbone tights to match the grey weather

inspiration:  radiohead "in rainbow" and c.'s "how to be spring"

looking forward:  performing in tomorrow night's show at muse with lalage

tights trajectory/ a missive poetry prompt

leaving utah--encountered blizzard outside of beaver, ut.

did i know the bowling shoes would match my dress in mesa, az.?

pool legs, sans tights, scottsdale, az. 

so, one more day of spring break "vacation" (decision:  taking kids places is not a vacation--it's much, much harder than going to work.  not to say it's not a worthwhile endeavor, but it's certainly not relaxing.  or is it just me?)

it's the end of the day, so i won't go into much detail, but we've gotten to see all siblings and spend an entire day at the pool, so mission accomplished--sun & sibs.  got to hold my newest nephew, marco, aka mr. bubbers/papi/chubby hubby.   he's very advanced and handsome, as are all my nieces and nephews.

i barely had time to post my guest poetry prompt from book balloon today, so i'll let it double for my blog post as well.  it's inspired by yesterday's post, and it uses jean valentine's poem again which i love more and more with each read.

i'd be so overjoyed to read anyone's attempt at this poem.  the idea for it is rather nascent, so it would be great to see how writers respond to it.

& DEFINITELY go to book balloon, register, go to the forum and click on "go--get creative."  janet mcadams has been posting a prompt for each day of april, except wednesdays when i prompt, and she has a few surprise guest poets coming up.  so do it!

A Missive, A Supplication

To whom do you supplicate?

I’ve been thinking about the poem as a prayer, a cry, a missive, a plea, an attempt to speak about something we need but we don’t have the right words, in the expository sense, to ask for. 

So we send a missive out into the world, “This is my letter to the world, that never wrote to me,” Emily Dickinson said, not knowing whom, exactly, in the world or universe, is listening, or what they will hear.

Prayer and poem connect on many points, but specifically in the way that they can be expressive in a non-direct, non-linear, nonsensical way that sometimes someone will understand and make their own sense of. 

I love this poem by Jean Valentine, and think of it as a prayer; in the end, God knows she needs to take “Jim” into the wide front porch of her lap.

The Rose


by Jean Valentine

a labyrinth,
as if at its center,
god would be there—
but at the center, only rose,
where rose came from,  
where rose grows—
& us, inside of the lips & lips:
the likenesses, the eyes, & the hair,
we are born of,
fed by, & marry with,
only flesh itself, only its passage
—out of where?    to where?

Then god the mother said to Jim, in a dream,
Never mind you, Jim,
come rest again on the country porch of my knees.




So here’s the prompt for a missive poem, after all my blah, blah, blahing (thanks for listening!)

A.  Dear __________________, (insert a word that is god-like or ungod-like here.  How about “toothbrush”?)  Please___________________________.  (Insert your cry for help here.)  It can make sense (“Brush my soul clean/Sweep my heart with your bristles") or not sense ("Please tell me who you are/change from neon pink to clear/make the teeth fall out of my head.")

Repeat this warm-up 10 times.  Here are a couple of my first attempts:

1. Dear Strawberry,  please curl me up in your tongue until tendrils sprout, and I become we.

2. O pencil, please write and unwrite, write and unwrite, write and unwrite until god’s breath makes me clear and blank as a spirit.

3.  Beloved bowl, please don’t mock me for overturning you and wearing you to the winter formal and pretending like you are an Alexander McQueen.

Okay, so some of those are silly, but I’m brainstorming and therefore not getting too critical yet.

B.  Choose three to five lines that you like and make a stanza for each, letting the prayer extend itself to wherever it wants to go?  (Who would EVER have predicted that, in Valentine’s poem,  “Jim” would come into the picture, or that god would be a mother rocking on the porch with her big comfortable lap for Jim to sit in?)

What I’m trying to say here is let your poem write itself into a prayer, let the poem tell you, your toothbrush, god, your pretty bowl, ripe strawberry, or the stars above, the words that need to be said.

Then post on book balloon, and/or get on your knees & speak your prayer aloud in a dark room.


legwear:  cocoa butter & bathing suit

inspiration: baby flesh/mr. bubbers

looking forward: to going back to work/routine

frippery, foppery, finery & such

spring bunny at clifford farms

did i mention that it's spring?
yesterday, teaching spring poems to students, one rad poet said:
"what's the big deal about spring?  it's so shallow."
another rad poet followed up the first rad poet's comment with:
"yeah, you just have to keep reminding yourself not to get too optimistic because it's gonna end in death."
clearly, these teen writers are true poets, no?
they both passed my "are you a true poet test" yesterday.

*
today was emotionally draining.
like i do every day, i asked
"why am i doing ______?"
are my motives pure or impure?
(impure ((always))).
(what is pure, anyhow?)
& sometimes that makes me tired.
you?

*

a dandy lives at clifford farms

ingrid posted this rad onion
article from,
get this,
1996.  (the 90's
were fine
& gay & i miss them.)
do yourself a favor
and read
foppish dandy disregards local constabulary
in the onion 
& while you're at it,
also read
women voters can't help fawning over sexist g.o.p.
also in the onion, also posted by ingrid
who is my curator of online life.  how totally rad
is the onion?  i would totally pay them
to let me write for them,  wouldn't you?

*
speaking of foppery, frippery & finery,
did you want some new tights?
cuz you currently have an excellent chance
of getting some.

*
 
did i not give you enough reading material today?
oops.  sorry about that.
here's a poem by allison adelle hedge coke, from the
poetry foundation:

Redwing Blackbird

Feet firmly perch

thinnest stalks, reeds, bulrush.

Until all at once, they attend my

female form, streaked throat, brownness.

Three fly equidistant

around me, flashing.

Each, in turn, calls territorial

trills, beckons ok-a-li, ok-a-li!

Spreads his wings, extends

inner muscle quivering red

epaulet bands uniquely bolden.

Turn away each suitor,

mind myself my audience.

Select another to consider,

He in turn quiver thrills.

Leave for insects.

Perhaps one male follows.

Maybe a few brood of young,

line summertime.

Silver Maple samaras

wing wind, spread clusters

along with mine, renewing Prairie.

As summer closes, I leave

dragonflies, damselflies, butterflies,

mosquitoes, moths, spiders, crickets for

grain, see, Sunflower;

join thousands to flock Sky—

grackles, blackbirds, cowbirds,     starlings—

Swarming like distant smoke clouds, rising.

legwear: nada, under maxi skirt

inspiration: knowing that i won't always feel this way

looking forward: to a change in energy 

exile

i just finished watching sons of perdition, a very intense and compelling documentary about children exiled from "the crick", so-called, a slice of earth under the control of warren jeffs, leader of the FLDS church. over the course of the film, you come to understand in at least a small way the huge price the boys profiled in the film have paid for their freedom. these exiles are unable to get into high school, get social security cards, or jobs, and worst of all, are cut off from their beloved families. in one heart breaking scene, a man who has been out of the community for eleven years says that his whole attitude towards family has changed since leaving: "you don't know what you have until it's gone." it's surprising to hear young people talking so fondly and lovingly of their families--the movie in some way derails our cultural expectations--we're so used to the stereotype of the rebellious teen who hates and resents their family of origin. these teens couldn't be more different.

i guess i made the stupid assumption that the people who got out of that community would be so glad to be gone that the loss of their family would be a price that they would gladly pay. or that the life they had lived under those circumstances would be so hellish that they would angry at their families for staying or putting up with it. instead, the three boys profiled in the film were loyal to their mothers and even their sometimes abusive fathers, and to their huge groups of siblings. in one of my favorite scenes, joe gets into the car after meeting briefly with his mother so she could sign papers in order for him to be able to work or go to school. he gets back into the filmmakers' car, and a 44 oz. soda cup from subway sits prominently in the cup holder next to him. he says he asked his mom if she couldn't have at least brought some soup from home. "oh, man. i miss my mom's cooking. that stuff 's good."

you all know that my primary way of expressing love for my family is by cooking for them & so this scene was especially wrenching for me. the juxtaposition of that subway cup against joe's desire for some of his mother's soup was tender. i hang out with teens a lot in my job, and most of them love nothing more than eating at subway. that scene vividly portrayed the essence of the homesickness the boys were feeling.

and it was heartbreaking to see how the mothers' hands are tied. if they try to protect their children or nurture the exiled ones in any way, they and the children who are left behind are in jeopardy.the boys in the film were a credit to their mothers--they struggled to act honorably, to lift up and protect their families, and displayed an incredible amount of strength and courage.

definitely see this film. it's out on netflix now, and it's fantastic.

it felt especially relevant this weekend, a weekend in which we try to honor the sacrifices made in the name of freedom and human rights, and hopefully do work to increase freedom for every person in the world.

at the end of sons of perdition, one of the boys says, "this is a kind of modern day slavery." the film is pretty convincing evidence of the fact.

& it occurred to me (again) how many stories of slavery and oppression are out there, in every corner of the world.

no one should be forced to forsake one's family or one's homeland in order to be free.

and yet,

so, so many have been forced to--

across centuries and oceans--

here's a snippet from margaret walker's poem "for my people" published in poetry magazine in 1937, and available in full text on the poetry foundation website (one of my most frequented websites):

For my people standing staring trying to fashion a better way

from confusion, from hypocrisy and misunderstanding,

trying to fashion a world that will hold all the people,

all the faces, all the adams and eves and their countless generations;

Let a new earth rise. Let another world be born. Let a

bloody peace be written in the sky. Let a second

generation full of courage issue forth; let a people

loving freedom come to growth. Let a beauty full of

healing and a strength of final clenching be the pulsing

in our spirits and our blood. Let the martial songs

be written, let the dirges disappear. Let a race of men now

rise and take control.



i'm glad we have a holiday to think about freedom, and hopefully figure out a way to "fashion a world that will hold all the people/ all the faces."

here's hoping that we won't need such a holiday one day.

inspiration: "trying to fashion a better way from confusion"--the imagination of a new way that julie wrote about in yesterday's blogpost.

legwear: tights (black)

only the poem

"How shall we get said what must get said?

Only the poem."

writes physician-poet william carlos williams near the opening of his poem the desert music.

outside, fat flakes of snow are falling, the first of the winter season, and inside i'm reading and re-reading the desert music and listening to steve reich's piece set to williams' text. a blissful two hours of reading, writing, and listening, warm inside, cold outside.

funny how one day you ask a question and the next day you get some sort of answer. today i read this about williams on the poetry foundation website:

"From the beginning," disclosed Linda Wagner, "he understood the tradeoffs: he would have less time to write; he would need more physical stamina than people with only one occupation.... [He] was willing to live the kind of rushed existence that would be necessary, crowding two full lifetimes into one,... learning from the first and then understanding through the second."

williams is one of those poets with which i feel a great affinity. i often fall in to the triadic line--i love the idea of two lives in one--i love the caretaker poet, --the crooked, greeny flower, --beauty emerging from the rubble of apocalypse,--the experimenter,--the americanist--the poet who dictates terms from which he cannot depart, no matter how his poems are received.

(in the poem, on his way to texas, williams passes through yuma, julie's hometown, and a town i have visited twice, once for a high school swimming meet and once on my honeymoon when our car broke down on the way to san diego. we spent a night at the space age motel in yuma.)

in texas, some tourist recognizes williams as the famous american poet:

"So this is William

Carlos Williams, the poet .

You seem quite normal. Can you tell me why? Why

does one want to write a poem?

Because it's there to be written.

Oh. A matter of inspiration then?

Of necessity.

Oh. But what sets it off?

I am he whose brains
are scattered
aimlessly"

my favorite thing in this passage is the ambiguity around the reply "of necessity." is inspiration necessary to the poem? or is the poem written of necessity "because it's there"? does what is there necessarily get written (it is written)?

i feel the powerful poetry of those brains "scattered aimlessly." i feel that necessity of making the world look at what is there. necessity is one of the only answers that makes sense, though the poet is so often accused of her irrelevance.

no. she is not. irrelevant, i mean.

necessary.

if you don't feel her/it's necessity, you should work on that, because your soul is in danger of a gangrenous death.

don't think i'm being hyperbolic. i mean it.

it's also comforting that williams, in his first thirty years of writing, made 132.00 from his work, and received very little major recognition. and yet he continued to work according to the calling he had listened to, according to the dictates of his conscience. poems emerging on prescription pads, following the material of his own lived life, in the world of the physical body, the births and deaths, the illness and poverty he witnessed.

and then, the closing stanzas made me cry:

I am a poet! I
am. I am. I am a poet, I reaffirmed, ashamed

Now the music volleys through as in
a lonely moment I hear it. Now it is all
about me. The dance! The verb detaches itself
seeking to become articulate .


And I could not help thinking
of the wonders of the brain that
hears the music and of our
skill sometimes to record it

it's so beautiful that williams knows the "wonders of the brain" as both a physician and as a poet. his double life inspires this desert girl today to continue attempting to crowd "two lifetimes into one" with faith and vigour.

p.s. legwear=snakeskin jeans, day two. a little baggier today. i don't love wearing jeans, but it's cold out, and i'm wimpy about cold these days.