30 Poems in 30 Days

[TheRainMan]

10-16

.....

 

[Tzara]

8

Liebestod

I cannot expect transfiguration,
Isolde's love jazzed as it was
by magic and by complex song.
My tune is achromatic,
with simple beat, though steady one.

No heldentenor, I, just off-key baritone
and my three chords are not so lush
as Wagner's plush suspended ones.
On other hand, although it's dumb,
this dull libretto's all my own.

Transfiguration? It's way too much
to think or ask of me and you. Instead
I play, methodic as a metronome,
learn how to bow your lovely strings
to get your instrument to sing,

and only seek your little death.

 

[4degrees]

13-25

the smell of books
such silence creates
the strangest suction
within my ears,
reversed white noise
mental static maybe
sensative to the unsuspecting now
while ignoring the huge and obvious
its not being oblivious;
deliberation of deliberate
there is none, and
what else is to be said?

 

[unpredictablebijou]

1-3

Friday Night

The talk at the bar turns to the subject
of blow jobs. Mike says, "Hell, yeah,
you got to give some if you want
to get some."

"I don't bother to ask," says Paul
and everyone laughs.

"I c'n git some
any time I want," says Rookie,
"any time. Who's up?"

"That's me," says Mike, "yeah,
you can get some..." and Rookie laughs,
grabs his beer and cue.

Brad lifts his drink.
"Once you get married, it's all -"
"Baby, you want that fur coat?" interrupts Mickey.
Brad laughs, sucks down some Miller.
"Hey Mickey, your table. Rack em."

The jukebox turns to Roy Orbison.
Davey leans over to me. He's thinking
hard. I say, "You think men are taught
to feel guilty about wanting that? About
liking it so much?"

"I don't know," he says. "I guess.
My ex, well, the thing was,
I didn't want it after a while
cause it was always a trade for her."

I nodded. "She wanted hers too, then."

"No, it wasn't that," he says, "I'd'a...
I mean, that was fine. It wasn't that, it was,
well, I'd take her to dinner, or
get her flowers or something, and she'd go,
'oh, I know what you're after'
and it wasn't about that, I didn't care.
I just wanted to take her to dinner,
just to be nice,
you know? She always turned it into that.
So I quit doin' it."

He takes a drink.
"I'm sorry to hear that," I said,
"that sucks."

"Aw, well," he says, "Hell,
it's over now anyway."
He takes another drink.
A nice long one.

 

[Sara Crewe]

7-8

Tonight I told him about the turtles.
I may have called them cute
when I explained how they sit
on the lonely rock in the middle
of the creek and dive through the lily
carpet when the heron walks
too close. I look for them every day
on my way to work but he hasn't
seen them once. Never noticed
the rock or looked at the creek.
Doesn't care about the colour
of this year's lilies. Eyes straight
ahead on the road, watching
pavement and guardrail. We drive

the same route with a different destination.
His is a parking spot and mine is in my mind.

 

[wildsweetone]

13.


...

Even on blustery days when the wild wind
whips the breath from my body
I recall your smell, that hazy musk
that lingers on your skin after sex
and leers at me from my memories
as if tempting me to divert, again.

I peer out the rain-soaked pane
wondering if you are cosy
in your shed,
busy with your workload
cleaning, tidying, marking
children's school-day memories
just so, even on blustery days.

 

[tungtied2u]

4-3

the elves are tiny,
but hard workers
so small as to be unseen
yet have sinus stuffing to an art

I've found they take
exactly 5 hours to carry enough
stuff to make it too rough to breath

No need for alarms or early morning
wake up calls, they leave a calling card
I gasp awake, puffy eyed , sore throated
and dreaming of you

At least they are kind enough to do that

 

[TheRainMan]

10-17

.....

 

[vampiredust]

6

Afterlife

Summer. The daily washing
away of things our parents
decide we don't need. Mom
hangs soaked blankets

on the windows to absorb
a crayola coloured sky.
Lightbulbs are taken out,
ready to be mothballed.

Cars are washed, programs
on computers labelled
before their bi-monthly
dissection. The television

is re-organised. Its language
divided and redivided
according to each highlighted
colour. Some verbs are forgotten.

We watch them outside,
measuring all those things
we may never know exists.
Life will be sold to the highest

bidder and all we will have left
will be locked away in the lines
on our palms and the safes
of our fingertips.

 

[Sara Crewe]

7-9

The line squeaks and howls
when I reel it toward the house.
I want to say it sounds like a moose
in heat but I have never met a moose
in heat and the ones I have met
have been rather quiet. A kamikaze
fly rudely interrupts my mental digression.
I flick him away and reach
into the soggy pile. Clothes pins bite
a pair of baseball pants with faint green
lines on the knees. Then a faded bikini
and an old t-shirt. Next some soccer
shorts and matching socks.
Another swimsuit follows and finally
two sleeping bags with secret
marshmallow spots that are melting
in the sun and dripping down onto the grass
like molten lava. I imagine it’s creating
chaos for the ant world below.
When my basket is empty I look
at the line and realize that yesterday
is blowing in the wind.

 

[unpredictablebijou]

1-4

Wood

There's been a branch down on the roof
of the wash house since October.
Silver maples will grow straight out
and weigh themselves down.
It's a good bunch of wood, maybe
ten inches at the base,
thirty feet long. On Saturday
I haul it down,
climbing around on the tin roof
to shove it off with my feet.
It's good and dry now, having fallen
already dead and seasoned all winter.
In an hour or two, with the good hacksaw,
it's a day's worth of heat for next November.

That afternoon there's a meeting
of the arts festival committee.
Stephanie insists on her house:
they've finished the new deck
and she points out features to me
in a loud whisper, while we sip ice tea
and Melissa tries to discuss
the route of the downtown art walk.

"We built it ourselves," she says,
pulling me over to admire the railing,
"well, not quite. I mean,
_they_ put in the frame, of course,
but my fiance and I nailed in all these slats
and he built that plant stand to match.
It's got three coats of stain - isn't that just
the perfect color? A walnut,
but with that reddish tinge..."
She leans conspiratorially toward me,
"It's going to raise the value
of this house so much,
I mean, people are _into_ decks.
Do you have a deck?"

I smile and shake my head.
"Building it ourselves was so
meaningful," she says. "Dear, you
really should experience it, I mean,
that's why they call it Sweat Equity."

I thought about sweat. It had been
breezy and cool under the maple tree.
The ice was melting in Melissa's tea.
We moved the meeting indoors
where there was shade
and air conditioning.

 

[Tzara]

9

A Cheap Solution to the 30/30 Problem: The List Poem

It's now the poem-time, the down time, the dreamtime.
It's the time I need to suck it up and focus.
It's that time I'm thinking/feeling neologous.
It's some time, kind of time, tense time, out of line.
It's time, that thirty/thirty time, get dirty time.
It's time for me to feel and not to think.
It's time I'd better think, and well, or else I'll stink.
It's time to think of what forms I might ride in.
It's time for me to wonder why I was sucked in.
It's time to just get something down, then make it right.
It's time to wrestle with my Muses, 'cuz Muses lose when pretty tight.
It's time to turn over that old poetic earthy loam.
It's sure as hell time to wind up a really lousy poem.
It's over, this poem mine, and downline, way re-write time.
It's time, anyway, gentlemen and ladies. It's time.
It's last call. Last call for any poems tonight.

It's time.

 

[Eluard]

1-9

. . .

 

[4degrees]

13-26

a yang for a yang
in all your fire i
see the glory of some
assumed heaven
wings that turn a snake
into a symbolistic dragon
with your own tiger
to somehow balance
like libra, but i'm opposed
and off kilter
black and white fits
into a circle
white on white fits
better, though.

 

[wildsweetone]

14.

Winter Pastimes

There are traditions to uphold
when the power cuts out
during winter evenings.

Bread toasted by fire flame,
hot chocolate boiled
on the bar-b-que
and the jested cheating
of the bank manager
during Monopoly
played by a dozen candles in saucers
until midnight.

Sleep comes easy then,
the flickering street-light melody
is replaced by squally gusts

that rip the last Autumn leaves,
rain that pelts windows
and fluffy duvets
that share the snuggle
of skin.

 

[Eluard]

1-10

. . .

 

[TheRainMan]

10-18

.....

 

[vampiredust]

7

The Geography of Canals

I.

My tongue navigates
the sweat canals
of her flesh. Pushed
along by a monsoon
heat, they make light
work of the locks
between her thighs.

II.

Schiaparelli discovered
canals on Mars. His eyes
thought they were from
a Roman goddess
and the long thin canals
inside his body enlarged,
eager to let her through.

III.

An oyster-catcher
waits on a Kentish beach,
waiting for the sea
to deliver a cargo hauled
from saltwater canals.
It lies in transit, that is
what canals are for.

 

[Tzara]

10

Writing Poems in 100 Degree Heat

Hot weather makes me indolent.
It's not conducive to writing poems. You see,
I just push words idly around the page,
roll them in my mouth like lemonade.
They're mildly tangy and way too sweet.

Take indolent itself. It's a lazy word—
round, drawn-out, soft—that seduces writers
with its plump curves and soon enough
you've spent the morning running your tongue
over and over its languorous form. What's bad

about that? you ask. A poet should be in love
with words.
................And so he should. But this isn't love,
this languid trance, just summertime flirtation.
Despite the heat, your poem isn't even warm.
It's just some words curled up asleep.
...................................................Well,
at least my sweet indolent has swell hips.
I think I'll nuzzle her right now and nap a bit.




Note to the non-Americanski: 100° F = 38° C. Sorta.

 

[unpredictablebijou]

1-5

Recipe for Cream of Grrrrl

Mix all ingredients and simmer over low heat
for 24 years


6 tbs. sweet butter
3 C creme fraiche
1/2 C broken glass
1 dozen red roses
comedy/tragedy masks
a strip of leather
lipstick, candy-apple red
a black ribbon
6 unidentified mushrooms
1 C Merlot
a spider
a rubber band
1 tsp. oil of clove
nine thorns
nine stones
nine dead ladybugs
two halves of an object
an apple
an apple
an apple


*

 

[wildsweetone]

15.

...

We stare at candle flames
as if they will emit more than light,

more than the occasional
splutter of sparks
that are all noise
and no substance.

There is a holiness in the burning,
an inevitability of the end of belief
that light will follow the dark,

a belief that compounds
with the last flickering.

Smoke curls, carrying up dreams
and wishes, prayers and peace,
cradled in its hazy curls.

 

[Sara Crewe]

7-10

I know you don’t mean to package
me inside a box with a plastic cover
that allows you to check if my eyes
will close when you lay me down
on the bed but when you choose
a partner younger than your youngest
baby the truth is as clear
as your new bride’s porcelain skin.
How can you say you love
someone who can only smile
and nod in return? You can’t.
Love and commitment are fathomed
deep. Down where the water
is so cold you’re hot and you keep
swimming forward even though
you can’t see your own hands.
It’s dangerous but you just don’t care.

Why are you sifting for fool’s gold
in the river bed while the women
walk by unnoticed. I hate to break it
to you but it’s not a cake
if all you have is a bowl of frosting.
Better put that one in the fridge
soon because the ring won't keep
even a doll from spoiling with age.
It will be a test of your ignorance
to see if you spend your whole life
licking the spoon or if some day
you get hungry for the real thing
and step outside of your box.

 

[tungtied2u]

4-4

I am missing words
insinuation through arrangement
the implication of what could be
given certain circumstance

the repetition of reality
moments once realized, now a shadow
which exist only with moonlight
three glasses of wine and want

I remember a woman, a dream
who moved without feet, floated
along corridors of hand held candelabras
ethereal, not of this earth

brought heaven to heart, mouth and loins
ambrosia to a starving soul, depleted
by years of going without the whisper
of words of tenderness into waiting ears

 

[4degrees]

13-27

inspiration ran away
comes again about
every five days, or so
more or less
lest i confess to
no rhyme nor reason
going through motionless
motions, keeping the blood
flowing
keeping it red. read
again times ten, still
the package over synthesises
the contents. content is
the only poem i know.

descriptive wonders of a
natural planet and mystic
loveare overdone
tough and chewy from
being cooked inside
my microwave head too long.
burning bubbles into cement,
to a point where what i meant
just doesn't sound good,
any longer.

 

[vampiredust]

8

The Rain Villages

We woke to the sight
of rain conquering
new territory, the way
it always does.

Gutters ordered
a retreat, cobblestones
surrended. Our daily
path to the post office

and butcher hampered
by lines of polystyrene
particles and pieces
of newspaper marching

to some unknown
resting place. Our boots
offered prayers;
the swelling veins

of our hands ready
to commence battle
like our forefathers
had done once.