two little poems
Some of you may have read my post on quitting smoking. I know two of you did, because you made kind comments (thank you). I would now like to share my miniature poems, the first signs of life after shocking my brain by cutting off its smoke and nicotine supply.
Crisis
I can’t punctuate each breath with smoke
or walk on smoke, mentally,
a trick I learned too young.
My voice feels like a yo-yo self-
motivated, leaving my grip,
visiting Japan or maybe
Senegal. I can’t make thoughts
by pouring strong coffee
on my frontal lobes; I can’t
write poems.
The other poem was inspired by a fellow blogger.
Untitled
When I am asked
how I began writing poems
I say I did it in my head
midwinter, Texas,
last ride through the neighborhood
on my big green bike; I stopped
and stood beholding prickly pear
in a vacant lot which the hillside
formed into a gentle L-shape;
the clubs of the cactus
were proud against turquoise;
I photographed them mentally then
when I was ten.
I welcome any feedback. I would like to know if there's any future for me as a poet without the omnipresent cylinders of tobacco. If not, I would still hope to have the sense to avoid the nasty weed. So please be honest.
--- Harriet.
posted by HL @ 5:40 AM
4 Comments:
I like the mental image of walking on smoke. And I like the untitled poem. You and Gwen and Lisel Mueller have inspired me. I'm going to have to write my own version.
p.s. Ask me sometime about getting stuck in a Dickinson class by accident in undergrad.
Harriet dear, smoking and writing poems are not codependent, and certainly not for you. You can break the addiction of smoking, but not of poetry ;) Check my blog for my own smoking "crisis" poem. Loved both of yours, you don't usually write shorter poems and these work so well, really good.
PS--Amy, don't like E.D.?
PPS--Sorry to Harriet for using her nuthouse to ask Amy about E.D.
Yeah, Stacia, I'm not a big fan of Dickinson. I guess she's just not my style. I failed to read the catalog carefully enough and ended up stuck in a class called "Structures of Verse: The Poems of Emily Dickinson" my last semester at UCF. I moaned and complained a whole lot, but I did learn from it. For one thing, I learned a few things I can appreciate about ED even if I still don't like her so much. I learned why other people love her and that there's something to be learned from everything I read.
p.s. I'm posting my own version of your untitled poem. This is an extremely rough draft, so don't laugh.
When I am asked
how I began writing poems,
I talk about my father’s bruised
thumbnail, how my father, grandfather
and uncles, all carpenters
stride the bare trusses of my childhood
in cracked leather boots, each
with one ridged fingernail turning
purple then black then yellow forever.
They are building our home
out of things that can hurt them—
concrete blocks and rough wood
and nails longer than my fingers.
My mother collects all the dropped
nails and shingles, singing
John Denver songs.
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