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Category: Poems

Poems written by me.

Sentences and Corrections

March 17, 2010 • • 6 Comments

The guy from the attorney general’s office
blamed the nouns, sources of all trouble—
people, places, things.

Combined with certain verbs—
assault, distribute, trespass and possess—
these nouns form gangs of complex sentences,
fragments of lives half-lived and run-ons
rambling through the detritus of car crash lives.

The simplest, though, tell of kids locked up,
looking out at the free, positions of attention
in the parking lot, half-listening
to mockingbirds refining their own syntax
as they mimic the ringing fire alarm
while we wait to go back inside
where we’ll try, again, writing

sentences that don’t mimic the past,
sentences that aren’t destinies.

Hummingbird Heading Out to Sea

February 10, 2010 • • 31 Comments

 

Does the hummingbird know
the vastness of the Gulf of Mexico
when land is lost from sight?

Oil rigs and shrimping boats—
fast-blurred memories, random ghosts afloat
where sky and sea seem one.

Is there any inkling
of monsters below that other ceiling
birds can scarce imagine?

Tiny feathered jewel,
leagues from any flower’s nectar fuel,
how do you know the way?

Above those trackless seas,
in doldrum times of windless apogee,
one heart of pebble’s size

pounds alone against the gulf,
pounds alone against the world.

—

One of the most amazing bird migrations is that of the Ruby-throated Hummingbird. On its southbound journey from eastern North America to its wintering grounds in Central and South America, it flies up to 500 miles nonstop over the Gulf of Mexico.

Update: This post was included in I and the Bird #119 hosted at Somewhere in NJ.

Lines Discovered in an Aging Ornithologist’s Field Journal

January 25, 2010 • • Leave a comment

 

When the end comes, don’t
plant me in the ground, trapped
in just one piece of earth.

Why not leave me by
the highway for the vultures
and maybe for the crows
who will take my sleeping eyes.

Then, at last, I could soar,
finally fly on dusky wings
outstretched,

buried in the sky.

—

“Lines Discovered in an Aging Ornithologist’s Field Journal” was one of 3 poems originally published at Thirteen Myna Birds in July 2009. Poems don’t stick around long over there before they fly away, so I’m posting them here for those who may have missed them back in July. This is 3 of 3. It has been slightly modified from its original form. The others can be found here and here.

I’m continuing to dabble with audio blogging, this time seeing how it goes reading one of my poems. I don’t know how often I’ll do this, but it was surprisingly easy to get the reading. I even edited a little bit since I liked the end of one take and the beginning of another.

God Hates Grackles

January 19, 2010 • • 9 Comments

They drove down from some mega church in Kansas with signs reading, “God hates grackles,” and “Grackles spread disease & crap on everything.” One little girl with blond pigtails tied with blue ribbons carried a sign saying, “No more icky turds.” They marched up and down the street outside the capitol chanting verses from Leviticus about unclean birds, occasionally stopping to extol the virtues of godly American fried chicken and turkey club sandwiches. From their trees, the grackles watched with little interest. They heard the repetitive nuk-nuk-nuk of the chanters and wondered at the rusty-hinge noises they made on the street below but mostly, they preened their shiny purple feathers and craned their necks toward the open sky above.

This went on for most of the afternoon and as the heat increased, the protesters grew more desperate, more willing to go beyond the veil of free speech. One man cast a stone. There was a moment’s pause as the world waited for the grackles to craft a response. Seconds grew to minutes, and the protesters glanced at one another, nervous, waiting. Suddenly all the grackles exploded skyward in a storm of wings and wild hallelujahs. The protesters watched with squinted eyes as the birds flew ever higher, each beat of their dark wings carrying them deeper into the sky and closer to God than anyone on the street below could imagine.

Blinded by the summer sky into which the grackles had disappeared, the protesters fumbled for their signs, packed them back on the bus, cursing the ugly grackles for their filthy ways and for not being blue birds or cardinals. Resentful and wishing that they too had wings and beautiful iridescent plumage, they drove back north, never once leaving the ground.

—

“God Hates Grackles” was one of 3 poems originally published at Thirteen Myna Birds in July 2009. Poems don’t stick around long over there before they fly away, so I’m posting them here for those who may have missed them back in July. This is 1 of 3.

The Test

January 7, 2010 • • 22 Comments

She stood with hands on hips,
rosaceous hair pulled taut
and twisted into a psyche knot.
Her eyes’ prism revealed
an overglaze of reason as she
watched the numismatist’s
logical fingers trace over some
ancient artist’s vision captured in
the obverse engraving. They lingered
on the junk’s rounded sails carving
paths through southern seas.
“These sails should be square,” he said.
“I’m certain this is fake. I’d be happy to—”
Her lips curled in satisfaction.
His eyes followed the incorruptible
ecliptic of the coin’s path to her purse.
He watched her walk away, dull heels
clicking against stained tile, a music
soon dampened by the snow
and city streets. Listening to her fade,
he wondered how she knew the
master forger’s work was worth
much more than the original.

—

This is for Read Write Poem’s latest prompt (#108). Click here to read what others did with this prompt.

I picked two words salmon and binocular and flipped backwards through the dictionary letting my eyes fall on random words between the two I’d initially chosen. I had decided to use 10 words and have them appear in the poem in order of discovery.

Those words were: rosaceous, psyche knot, prism, overglaze, numismatist, logical, junk, incorruptible, ecliptic, and coin.

In other news, as a holiday gift for family and friends, I made a chapbook out of the micro-poems I post on my other blog. I saved a few to give away here. If you’d like one, use the contact form to tell me where to mail it and it’ll be on its way. First five Next three callers.

Pomegranate Surface Features

December 3, 2009 • • 25 Comments

If I could study these spheres long enough
to see canals as Schiaparelli saw,
or invent for them tragic civilizations
like those dying while Lowell watched,

these pomegranates might reveal
the wildest tricks of the light.

I’d stake my rep on pomegranate people
living out tiny desperate lives,
their doomed world sure to be destroyed
for the jeweled seeds inside.

—

This is for Read Write Poem’s Image Prompt (#103), a picture of two pomegranates. Inspired as much, I think by my recent reading of Mars: The Lure of the Red Planet by William Sheehan and Stephen James O’Meara, a fascinating history of our understanding of Mars.

Where there were pomegranates, I saw planets. I suppose we’re all a bit like Schiaparelli and Lowell in that we often see what we want to see.

For those who may not know, Giovanni Schiaparelli (1835-1910) was the Italian astronomer who first reported seeing “canali” on Mars. It was a trick of the light and the human eye as well as, possibly, his colorblindness, but the name “canali,” which in Italian means “channel” was mistranslated to “canal” in English. American astronomer Percival Lowell (1855-1916) took canal to mean artifical channel and reasoned that Mars was populated by a dying civilization building canals across the surface to irrigate the deserts with what little water remained on their doomed planet.

Read what others saw in those two pomegranates here.

Update: Don’t miss Angie Werren’s “planet pomegranate” at woman, ask the question. She too saw Mars in those fruits and wrote an amazing poem.