Tag Archives: poetry

Poison

Poison
September 27, 2008

I remember when poison
was clearly marked
with a skull and bones,
and, drunk by grinning cartoon characters,
resulted in Xed eyes, a dramatic expiration,
eyes uplifted to heaven,
fanfared closing credits,
and then they’re back
for another improbable episode.

Like many lessons learned on Saturday
mornings, this one falls rather short.

Sugar Smacks are not a complete breakfast,
and knowing is much,
much less than half the battle.

This poisonous man invades
our safe places with bows,
eyes uplifted to heaven, and servile
words that fool no-one — unless, perhaps,
he fools himself, truly believes
that poison unseen, hidden away,
imagined gone,
miraculously transubstantiates
into grape juice,

that those of us who have drunk
deeply of this
too-many-years aged vintage
spontaneously spring back up
for another slapstick-filled
show, brought to you
by Matel and Kool-Aid,

and by Arsenic,
part of this complete breakfast.

Flying Eagle Water Colors

Flying Eagle Water Colour, 12 Colours
September 14, 2008

It seemed a shrewd trade
at the time — a bulging
Ziploc bag of stickers
for a box of Flying Eagle
Water Colours, with magical
names like Prussian Blue, Vermillion,
Chrome Yellow Mid.,
and Emerald Green.

Charles disagreed, assured me
that the allure of Cobalt Blue
would fade, and I would yearn
for my “Kick Me” stickers.
He felt I should have invested
more wisely. For example,
give him the stickers, and then bask
in the Yellow Ochre warmth
of a good deed, done for a loyal friend.

I relinquished to Andrea the 1001 Funny Stickers,
accepted the exotic hues
from far away China
to reflect the Lemon Yellow rays of my imagination
in more than oriental splendor.

But then, for twenty years,
not much happened.

The Burnt Sienna petrified.
The Carmine coagulated a little.
The box travelled
with me across an ocean
and through five or six moves,
never used for anything
but a conversation starter,

until I caught the Light Green
eyes of my artist,
and knew, at last, that
I had traded well.

I expect, now rediscovered, the paints
will quickly be used up, turning many
Black and White shadows
into a spectrum of
images so long boxed up and carried around

unseen.

Reasonable Doubt

Reasonable Doubt
September 21, 2008

I don’t remember
of what he stood accused —
only that I sat in judgment,
declared him guilty
beyond reasonable doubt,
sent him to serve time
for an infraction of which
I had no conclusive proof,
just the word of others
hardly above reproach themselves,
of whim I had
plenty of doubt.

We asked just one question,
my eleven colleagues and I:
What constitutes reasonable doubt?
How much doubt, exactly,
is reasonable, your honor?
His honor declined to answer —
insisted, in fact, that his refusal
to answer was, itself,
a fundamental pillar of the phrase
“A Jury Of Your Peers.”

We were not his peers.

He, poor and dark,
trouble-stained and life-weary.

We, privileged and pale,
inclined to have unreasonable doubts,
based more in the fact that
we were not his peers
than in any facts presented
by those more his peers
than we.

So we determined,
the twelve of us,
that our doubt was reasonable,
and stripped this young man
of his youth and manhood.

One of us said
what the rest of us thought:
If he hadn’t done this,
surely he had done something.

I have no doubt
that given more opportunity
and less doubt
this young man would have given
us more opportunity to doubt.

I have no doubt
that that’s not reasonable.

Dreams

I can’t claim credit for this. This is a senryu by Jimmy, our favorite wait-person at The Pub, where we go whenever we can afford to.

You may dream your dreams
in C++, but I dream
mine in A Minor.

Who’s There

Who’s There?
September 15, 2008


From the Weekend Wordsmith

I see him, every now and then,
peeking out for a moment,
and then he’s gone.

I’d like to think I can coax
him out, cajole him into performing
his trick of writing a few beautiful lines,
but it seldom works
that way. When thrust into the lights
he retreats, embarrassed, into the shadows.

Sometimes he shakes me awake
in the night with something to write.
If I don’t get up right away,
he slouches off, discouraged,
and doesn’t try twice.

But if I leap up right away, write
as he dictates, he always rewards
my loss of sleep with a clever turn
of phrase that I can seldom arrive at.

alone. The best I can usually produce
without him
is something more like this.

Sestinas and writer’s block

A sestina is a poetic form. It consists of six-line stanzas, with each stanza’s lines ending in the same six words, in a different order for each stanza. Then there is a final stanza, called the envoi, in which each line contains two of the six words.

You can see examples of sestinas here, or provide your own six words to see what form comes out.

It is incredibly hard to write a sestina that doesn’t sound forced, and hardly anybody ever manages it. A really good sestina, when read aloud, is not immediately identifiable as a sestina. It just sounds like there’s a rhythm in there, but you can’t quite place it until you read it that third or fourth time, and see it on a page.

Most sestinas, however, work for the first stanza, and possibly the second, but after that you feel that the author is just saying any old nonsense just to stay in the form.

Sestinas work best when they are about a repetitive topic. Examples might be a child’s game, or an addiction, or a daily event. So I thought that the latest topic on Inspire Me Thursday – Breath – would be ideal for it. Unfortunately, so far, it just sounds like, after the first stanza, I’m merely babbling to fit the form.

I’ve had a really hard time writing lately. Everything feels forced, both fiction, poetry, and nonfiction. I keep hoping that if I force it long enough, it’ll start to flow. But the pump refuses to be primed.

Laugh, Baby


For the Weekend Wordsmith

Laugh, Baby
August 15, 2008

Laugh now, little one,
it’s all tears ahead –
a vale of tears
through which we mourn
and weep, on even the best
of days.

Laugh, and do not listen
to those who tell you your lot
is a harsh one.
I’ll let you in on a little secret,
just between us:
They say that only
because they forgot to laugh
when they had the chance –

thought laughter impious,
thought tears the path
of righteousness.

I’m glad John mentioned
that Jesus wept for his friends.
He’d have done well to note
how often he laughed with them.

So laugh, my angel,
while you’re yet a baby,
that when you are old
you will still be young.

Croissants

From the Weekend Wordsmith


Croissants
August 9, 2008

Flour, some water,
butter – mustn’t forget butter,
real butter, not oil or margarine,
but butter –
these are the ingredients
for a memory.
A little Nutella for sweetness,
a café au lait to wash it down,
and the Paris sky
warming our faces and our hearts.

Waiting

For the Weekend Wordsmith.
Yes, I’m several months behind.

Waiting
August 8, 2008

We watch them waiting
for so many things that will come
too soon.
Waiting for school, for summer, for school again.
Waiting for the weekend, the trip to the zoo,
that package to arrive.

While we wait for things that may not
come at all.

All those years that I waited,
now irretrievable,
opportunities frittered away
while sitting at the red light
without the foresight
to take another road.