Poem-a-Thon

[tungtied2u]

Break of Day

Poem: "Break of Day," by Galway Kinnell.


He turns the light on, lights
the cigarette, goes out on the porch,
chainsaws a block of green wood down the grain,
chucks the pieces into the box stove,
pours in kerosene, tosses in the match
he has set fire to the next cigarette with,
stands back while the creosote-lined, sheet-
metal rust-lengths shudder but just barely
manage to direct the cawhoosh in the stove—
which sucks in ash motes through gaps
at the bottom and glares out fire blaze
through overburn-cracks at the top—
all the way to the roof and up out through into
the still starry sky starting to lighten,
sits down to a bowl of crackers and bluish milk
in which reflections of a 40-watt ceiling bulb
appear and disappear, eats, contemplates
an atmosphere containing kerosene stink,
chainsaw smoke, chainsmoke, wood smoke, wood heat,
gleams of the 40-watt ceiling bulb bobbing in blue milk.

 

[tungtied2u]

Carl Sandburg

Jerry

Six years I worked in a knitting mill at a machine
And then I married Jerry, the iceman, for a change.
He weighed 240 pounds, and could hold me,
Who weighed 105 pounds, outward easily with one hand.
He came home drunk and lay on me with the breath of stale
beer
Blowing from him and jumbled talk that didn't mean anything.
I stood it two years and one hot night when I refused him
And he struck his bare fist against my nose so it bled,
I waited till he slept, took a revolver from a bureau drawer,
Placed the end of it to his head and pulled the trigger.
From the stone walls where I am incarcerated for the natural
term
Of life, I proclaim I would do it again.

_______________________________
Are there any ladies out there who can relate?

 

[tungtied2u]

From the Writer's Almanac

Poem: "Listening to Her Practice: My Middle Daughter, on the Edge of Adolescence, Learns to Play the Saxophone," by Barbara Crooker, from Ordinary Life (ByLine Press).

Listening to Her Practice: My Middle Daughter, on the Edge of Adolescence, Learns to Play the Saxophone

Her hair, that halo of red gold curls,
has thickened, coarsened,
lost its baby fineness,
and the sweet smell of childhood
that clung to her clothes
has just about vanished.
Now she's getting moody,
moaning about her hair,
clothes that aren't the right brands,
boys that tease.
She clicks over the saxophone keys
with gritty fingernails polished in pink pearl,
grass stains on the knees
of her sister's old designer jeans.
She's gone from sounding like the smoke detector
through Old MacDonald and Jingle Bells.
Soon she'll master these keys,
turn notes into liquid gold,
wail that reedy brass.
Soon, she'll be a woman.
She's gonna learn to play the blues.

 

[Angeline]

The First Night of Fall and Falling Rain
Delmore Schwartz

The common rain had come again
Slanting and colorless, pale and anonymous,
Fainting falling in the first evening
Of the first perception of the actual fall,
The long and late light had slowly gathered up
A sooty wood of clouded sky, dim and distant more and
more
Until, at dusk, the very sense of selfhood waned,
A weakening nothing halted, diminished or denied or set
aside,
Neither tea, nor, after an hour, whiskey,
Ice and then a pleasant glow, a burning,
And the first leaping wood fire
Since a cold night in May, too long ago to be more than
Merely a cold and vivid memory.
Staring, empty, and without thought
Beyond the rising mists of the emotion of causeless
sadness,
How suddenly all consciousness leaped in spontaneous
gladness,
Knowing without thinking how the falling rain (outside, all
over)
In slow sustained consistent vibration all over outside
Tapping window, streaking roof,
running down runnel and drain
Waking a sense, once more, of all that lived outside of us,
Beyond emotion, for beyond the swollen
distorted shadows and lights
Of the toy town and the vanity fair
of waking consciousness!

 

[denis hale]

Hi Ange!

THE GUN by Stephen Dobyns

Late afternoon light slices through the dormer window
to your place on the floor next to a stack of comics.
Across from you is a boy who at eleven is three years
older. He is telling you to pull down your pants.
You tell him you don't want to. His mother is out
and you are alone in the house. He has given you a Coke,
let you smoke two of his mother's nonfilter Pall Malls,
and years later you can still picture the red packet
on the dark finish of the phonograph. You stand up
and say you have to go home. You live across the street
and only see him in summer when he returns from school.
As you step around the comics toward the stairs,
the boy gives you a shove, sends you stumbling back.
Wait, he says, I want to show you something.
He goes to a drawer and when he turns around
you see he is holding a small gun by the barrel.
You feel you are breathing glass. You ask if it is
loaded and he says, Sure it is, and you say: Show me.
He removes the clip, takes a bullet from his pocket.
See this, he says, then puts the bullet into the clip,
slides the clip into the butt of the gun with a snap.
The boy sits on the bed and pretends to study the gun.
He has a round fat face and black hair. Take off
your pants, he says. Again you say you have to go home.
He stands up and points the gun at your legs. Slowly,
you unhook your cowboy belt, undo the metal buttons
of your jeans. The slide down past your knees.
Pull down your underwear, he tells you. You tell him
you don't want to. He points the gun at your head.
You crouch on the floor, cover your head with your hands.
You don't want him to see you cry. You feel you are
pulling yourself into yourself and soon you will be
no bigger than a pebble. You think back to the time
you saw a friend's cocker spaniel hit by a car and you
remember how its stomach was split open and you imagine
your face split open and blood and gray stuff escaping.
You have hardly ever thought of dying, seriously dying,
and now as you grow more scared you have to go to the bathroom
more and more badly. Before you can stop yourself,
you feel yourself pissing into your underwear.
The boy with the gun sees the spreading pool of urine.
You baby, he shouts, you baby, you're disgusting.
You want to apologize, but the words jumble and
choke in your throat. Get out, the boy shouts.
You drag your pants up over your wet underwear and
run down the stairs. As you slam out of his house,
you know you died up there among the comic books
and football pennants, died as sure as your friend's
cocker spaniel, as sure as if the boy had shot your
face off, shot the very piss out of you. Standing
in the street with urine soaking you pants, you watch
your neighbors pursuing the orderly occupations
of a summer afternoon: mowing a lawn, trimming a hedge.
Where is that sense of the world you woke with
this morning? Now it is smaller. Now it has gone away.

 

[tungtied2u]

Re:The Gun

Wow Denis. That was some very powerful stuff.

 

[Angeline]

Re: Hi Ange!

THE GUN by Stephen Dobyns

Late afternoon light slices through the dormer window
to your place on the floor next to a stack of comics.
Across from you is a boy who at eleven is three years
older. He is telling you to pull down your pants.
You tell him you don't want to. His mother is out
and you are alone in the house. He has given you a Coke,
let you smoke two of his mother's nonfilter Pall Malls,
and years later you can still picture the red packet
on the dark finish of the phonograph. You stand up
and say you have to go home. You live across the street
and only see him in summer when he returns from school.
As you step around the comics toward the stairs,
the boy gives you a shove, sends you stumbling back.
Wait, he says, I want to show you something.
He goes to a drawer and when he turns around
you see he is holding a small gun by the barrel.
You feel you are breathing glass. You ask if it is
loaded and he says, Sure it is, and you say: Show me.
He removes the clip, takes a bullet from his pocket.
See this, he says, then puts the bullet into the clip,
slides the clip into the butt of the gun with a snap.
The boy sits on the bed and pretends to study the gun.
He has a round fat face and black hair. Take off
your pants, he says. Again you say you have to go home.
He stands up and points the gun at your legs. Slowly,
you unhook your cowboy belt, undo the metal buttons
of your jeans. The slide down past your knees.
Pull down your underwear, he tells you. You tell him
you don't want to. He points the gun at your head.
You crouch on the floor, cover your head with your hands.
You don't want him to see you cry. You feel you are
pulling yourself into yourself and soon you will be
no bigger than a pebble. You think back to the time
you saw a friend's cocker spaniel hit by a car and you
remember how its stomach was split open and you imagine
your face split open and blood and gray stuff escaping.
You have hardly ever thought of dying, seriously dying,
and now as you grow more scared you have to go to the bathroom
more and more badly. Before you can stop yourself,
you feel yourself pissing into your underwear.
The boy with the gun sees the spreading pool of urine.
You baby, he shouts, you baby, you're disgusting.
You want to apologize, but the words jumble and
choke in your throat. Get out, the boy shouts.
You drag your pants up over your wet underwear and
run down the stairs. As you slam out of his house,
you know you died up there among the comic books
and football pennants, died as sure as your friend's
cocker spaniel, as sure as if the boy had shot your
face off, shot the very piss out of you. Standing
in the street with urine soaking you pants, you watch
your neighbors pursuing the orderly occupations
of a summer afternoon: mowing a lawn, trimming a hedge.
Where is that sense of the world you woke with
this morning? Now it is smaller. Now it has gone away.

Hi Denis.

I have heard of Stephan Dobyns. I know I've seen his name before, but can't recall his poems. This is painful to read, of course, because whether it is a figment of Dobyns's imagination or a memory of his own or somone else's experience, it's real. Stuff like this happens. We all have some version of this--maybe less harrowing, but nonetheless painful, that could be a poem. I've written a few of my version of this.

It also made me think of the Doors song, The End--you know: The killer awoke before dawn... that thing?

 

[denis hale]

Yeah,

he's good, and very prolific. He apparently has a book out-- essays on the subject of Poetics. I'll look up the title, and get back to ya on it.

dhm

 

[LilDarlin]

~The Gun~

Wow~~!!! That was awesome... Thanks Denis

I loved that. Was moving and very powerful....I am goin out tomorrow an finding more of Stephan Dobyns. Makes one think about going into strangers rooms huh.. Also brings to mind that no one really knows what the day will bring. For you it might be the best day. Others it might be their worst day ever.. Neighbors mowin the lawn an havin a normal day, when this boy was goin thru hell..

Wow.. ~~~Thanks again Denis

 

[Angeline]

Re:

Yeah,

he's good, and very prolific. He apparently has a book out-- essays on the subject of Poetics. I'll look up the title, and get back to ya on it.

dhm

gracias my dear.



PS-- did you ever read Ted Berrigan's On the Level Everyday? It's very good--essays on poetry.

Here's a review:

Ted Berrigan (1934-1983) was one of his generation's most respected poets and one of its most influential teachers. In many ways, the directions followed in contemporary poetry were established by him in the classes and poetry workshops he taught at the university of Michigan, Yale, the City College of New York, the Stevens Institute of Technology, the University of Essex (England), Northeastern Illinois University, Iowa, the Jack Kerouac School of the Naropa Institute, and elsewhere. On the Level Everyday brings together several of Berrigan's key lectures and talks along with other pieces that offer an introduction to his own work and the problems of surviving as a poet in America today; given the range of Berrigan's influence, Ted Berrigan: On The Level Everyday is crucial to an understanding of poetry in our time. Indeed, Ted Berrigan is among the dozen or so of the critically important American poets of the second half of the 20th century. Ted Berrigan: On The Level Everyday is a much needed testament to his achievements and enduring literary influence.

~ Midwest Review Journal

 

[denis hale]

Ange

The name of the Dobyns book is "Best Words, Best Order"; it's on Amazon. Yeah, you turned me on to Berrigan. I remember.


PM me sometime. Push my buttons. lol

d

 

[Angeline]

Re: Ange

The name of the Dobyns book is "Best Words, Best Order"; it's on Amazon. Yeah, you turned me on to Berrigan. I remember.


PM me sometime. Push my buttons. lol

d

oh i will. but not now. i have`a cold. i feel yukky. i'm going back to bed. to sleep.

 

[tungtied2u]

More Stephen Dobyns

From the writer's almanac

Poem: "Cezanne and the Love of Color" by Stephen Dobyns, from Body Traffic © Penguin. Reprinted with permission.

Cezanne and the Love of Color

Because his wife refused to miss a dress fitting,
she missed his death instead. He painted to the last,
a portrait in profile of his gardener sitting
in a green light, with a sprawling shadow cast
on the wall behind him. His son too arrived too late,
preferring with his mother the rich life of Paris.
Then, thinking his fame wouldn't last and heavy in debt,
they quickly sold his paintings, foolishly reckless
in their acceptance of small sums. "You see," his wife
told Matisse, "Cezanne couldn't paint. He didn't have
the talent to complete his pictures." Her fear
cost her a fortune. At the very end of his life
Cezanne wrote, "Long live those who have the love
of color - true representatives of light and air."


Thought some out there might be interested in a book of his work.

 

[Angeline]

Re: More Stephen Dobyns

From the writer's almanac

Poem: "Cezanne and the Love of Color" by Stephen Dobyns, from Body Traffic © Penguin. Reprinted with permission.

Cezanne and the Love of Color

Because his wife refused to miss a dress fitting,
she missed his death instead. He painted to the last,
a portrait in profile of his gardener sitting
in a green light, with a sprawling shadow cast
on the wall behind him. His son too arrived too late,
preferring with his mother the rich life of Paris.
Then, thinking his fame wouldn't last and heavy in debt,
they quickly sold his paintings, foolishly reckless
in their acceptance of small sums. "You see," his wife
told Matisse, "Cezanne couldn't paint. He didn't have
the talent to complete his pictures." Her fear
cost her a fortune. At the very end of his life
Cezanne wrote, "Long live those who have the love
of color - true representatives of light and air."


Thought some out there might be interested in a book of his work.

mornin sweety.

 

[tungtied2u]

Re: Re: More Stephen Dobyns

mornin sweety.

Good mornin!

Here's somethin I ran across while surfin Dobyns-

Yannis Ritsos

PEOPLE AND SUITCASES
Don't leave your wet towel on the table.
It's time to start straightening up.
In a month or so, another summer will be over.
What a sad demobilization, putting away bathing suits,
sunglasses, short-sleeves, sandals,
twilight colors on a luminous sea. Soon,
the outdoor cinemas will be closed, their chairs
stacked in a corner. The boats will sail
less often. Safely back home, the lovely tourist girls
will sit up late, shuffling through color glossies
of swimmers, fishermen, oarsmen--not us. Already,
up in the loft, our suitcases wait to find out
when we'll be leaving, where we're going this time,
and for how long. You also know that inside
those scuffed, hollow suitcases there's a bit of string,
a couple of rubber bands, and not a single flag.

--Yannis Ritsos
translated by Martin McKinsey

 

[Angeline]

Re: More Stephen Dobyns

From the writer's almanac

Poem: "Cezanne and the Love of Color" by Stephen Dobyns, from Body Traffic © Penguin. Reprinted with permission.

Cezanne and the Love of Color

Because his wife refused to miss a dress fitting,
she missed his death instead. He painted to the last,
a portrait in profile of his gardener sitting
in a green light, with a sprawling shadow cast
on the wall behind him. His son too arrived too late,
preferring with his mother the rich life of Paris.
Then, thinking his fame wouldn't last and heavy in debt,
they quickly sold his paintings, foolishly reckless
in their acceptance of small sums. "You see," his wife
told Matisse, "Cezanne couldn't paint. He didn't have
the talent to complete his pictures." Her fear
cost her a fortune. At the very end of his life
Cezanne wrote, "Long live those who have the love
of color - true representatives of light and air."


Thought some out there might be interested in a book of his work.

This poem reminds me of my favorite Robert Browning poem Andrea del Sarto, which is a dramatic monologue about the Florentine Rennaissance painter. It's a long poem, but wonderful and well worth the read if you have a bit of time. It's also a great example of the dramatic monologue form (which I adore), in which the narrator (in this case, del Sarto) unintentionally reveals himself over the course of the poem.

 

[tungtied2u]

Re: Re: More Stephen Dobyns

This poem reminds me of my favorite Robert Browning poem Andrea del Sarto, which is a dramatic monologue about the Florentine Rennaissance painter. It's a long poem, but wonderful and well worth the read if you have a bit of time. It's also a great example of the dramatic monologue form (which I adore), in which the narrator (in this case, del Sarto) unintentionally reveals himself over the course of the poem.

I only just heard of Ritsos this morning. Some consider him the best Greek poet of the 20th century....apparently many of his works are compared to browning , for their content and form as well as thei length.

I'm going to the library to check out both Dobuyns and Ritsos today....what a treat!

 

[Angeline]

Re: Re: Re: More Stephen Dobyns

I only just heard of Ritsos this morning. Some consider him the best Greek poet of the 20th century....apparently many of his works are compared to browning , for their content and form as well as thei length.

I'm going to the library to check out both Dobuyns and Ritsos today....what a treat!

Really??? My lit crit opinion confirmed! How cool is that, lol.

So now I gotta go google Ritsos.

 

[tungtied2u]

One more Yannis Ritsos

NOT EVEN MYTHOLOGY (Yannis Ritsos)

The day ends that way, with brilliant colors, so lovely, without

anything at all happening for us. The guards forgetten in the guardhouses.

A boat floats in the shallows, the light golden and rose, foreign;

the nets in the slime gather black fish, fat and oily,

reflecting the glimmer of twilight. And later, when the lamps were lit,

we went inside and again returned to Mythology, searching

for some deeper correlation, some distant, general allegory

to soothe the narrowness of the personal void. We found nothing.

The pomegranate seeds and Persephone seemed cheap to us

in view of the night approaching heavily and the total absence.

 

[LilDarlin]

~Browning~

I went yesteday to the library..

I checked out Browning, how funny is that..

Yes I also love the Mythology stuff..
It makes me think deep thoughts and reason with the whole body of work..Great stuff..

 

[tungtied2u]

James Wright

Petition to the Terns

I have lived long enough to see
Many wings fall
And many others broken and driven
To stagger away on a slant
Of wind. It blows
Where it pleases to blow,
Or it poises,
Unaccountably,
At rest. Today, sails
Don't move
In the water,
In front of my eyes,
The huge dull scarlet men-of-war loll,uncaring and slobbish,
And stain
All the shore shallows
That men may hope to become
Green among
The sea
Is already unfriendly.
The terns of Rhode Island
Dart up out of the cattails, pounce on the sunlight,
Claim it,
And attack.
They must be getting their own back,
Against the wind. But the wind is no angrier
Than any wing it blows down,
And I wish the terns would give it
And me a break.

 

[Angeline]

I've posted this before

and I just put part of it in my sig line, but it's so good I have to post the whole thing again.

POETRY
Pablo Neruda

And it was at that age...Poetry arrived
in search of me. I don't know, I don't know where
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don't know how or when,
no, they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent fires
or returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.

I did not know what to say, my mouth
had no way
with names
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open,
planets,
palpitating planations,
shadow perforated,
riddled
with arrows, fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.

And I, infinitesmal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
I felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke free on the open sky.

 

[LilDarlin]

Angeline~

Oh Wow... That captures me.. I love it. I noticed before, but never really took the time to Read it. I will have to watch out for you more often. Great poem. Thanks for picking it to post, and for posting ALL of it.. simply wonderful!

 

[Angeline]

Re: Angeline~

Oh Wow... That captures me.. I love it. I noticed before, but never really took the time to Read it. I will have to watch out for you more often. Great poem. Thanks for picking it to post, and for posting ALL of it.. simply wonderful!

Yep, it's one of my favorite poems--really captures how I feel about poetry.

I'll have to post more of his stuff in this thread--he really is an incredible poet.

 

[Eleanora Day]

Those Petals
Ellen Doré Watson


Your words circle, mine batter. You’ve a ramp, I’ve
no wheels. Every Saturday we walk down a different
bumpy road in the wrong shoes. Sometimes,
just before dinner, the kid who gets the brunt
of our love has to tell us not to bicker. Darling!
Think of all the people with their right hands
chewed off! One says: I can’t get anyone to apply
direct pressure—my friends are so sick of me unhappy
they’ve turned off their machines. Hug me twice,
says another, I never know how long till the next body
I can touch. Then there’s the man who claims he wants steady,
needs steady, but still looks at women as if each one’s a lake
he’s big enough to swallow. How will hunger like that
ever learn three meals a day and use a napkin?
When you bring me Tuesday tenderness, it looks like
one more thing I don’t have time for. Maybe
when it comes to love the happily long-married
are the biggest fools: I’m fervent but off-and-on
about my roses—how many of us are delirious
when the twenty-sixth blossom does its gorgeous thing?
Today, though, I wonder if when I get home those petals
will still be luminous and melting in the dirt. I’m thinking
maybe I need them. I’m saying what would I do
without your mouth?