Wednesday, August 5, 2009

OBJECT PLANETARIUM

 

they were told wine was good for them

fantasies and activities

their passion for learning naïve and honorable

the edge of the bell curve

the bad cut of their jeans

try not to scream

taste for muscle

do you care?

encumber the edges of the sky

stay awake

a country of blondes

the spell of Uranus and Neptune

forever plastered

overly fond of brown

what anguish must be theirs!

 

the drill: stay high-minded

the unfulfilled urban space

not solitude but isolation

the trash that passes for art

a people without balconies

bed, let alone the house

your solar house, though

fascinated by lust

which probably has you thinking

court over everything

desperate to strut

to scurry away

sell out

the more deeply it points

the admiration for death

liable to poke back

no one remains a foreigner

sun-moon-Mars

Zgrabenalidongsteinloff

 

Alas, no matter

no impossible names

you need

the eyebrows of elegant racists

breaking a taboo or two, well,

they are the moon

living two lives

crazy-making

playing dead

 

 

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

New Assignment: Opposing Random Tandem

Find two completely different types of magazines. Examples: RollingStone + Food & Wine or Vogue + Field & Stream or Skateboarder + TIME

Tear out a page from each. Cut out words or phases that interest you, as many or as few as you want. Reassemble to create your new poem. Post results. Please add a title.

Sunday, July 26, 2009

the poem I tried to post last week . . . I don't usually write this sort of thing

far from any
ocean
mind imagines
only

concrete

abstractions do not
hold these
restive limbs this
beating core this
coiled mind

un-
wind

walls planes curves connect
almost seamless
smooth
absorb sun's ninety-three
million mile distant
poured rock
heat
inhale
exhale friction
radiates

wheels spin
gravity
feet push humming
speed
hands shoulders hips
whip body up
across
aloft concrete smooth
below

blood pulse momentum
glow

thigh muscle acid
burn
toes tense knees
sustain this
curve
this line this
turn this
infini-
tesimal
momen-
tary

release

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

the caballero’s dog

howls through the night

as if to prove to us

that air is what we breathe

and sun warms our skin

 

the caballero’s dog

knows things

has visions

sniffs out hidden meanings

and fetches them back to his master

 

in the darkest part of night

his howls peal from the east end of the valley

they catch the current of the stream running from the glacier

and careen down the valley to the villages below

 

moments later the howls spring off the southern ridge across from our camp

pulled by gravity yet refusing earthly landing

they echo into air

and make their way to camp

 

I remain awake for hours or minutes

waiting for the dog’s next song

 

 

 

 

 

Friday, July 17, 2009

towards

evening street lamp glistening
wet reflection
earthworms wriggling up

a river of springtime
rain puddles swell
invisible destination

fleet of flower boats
anchored
in brownie batter garden mud

Shadows, proceed me!
Shoes, carry me
home!

rain
tapping
on my shoulders
ok, here's the exercise.  go to one of your own poems, one that you like but think has more work to do.  choose a few lines or a stanza and let them start a new poem.  go!

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

whispering to the opus

A tornado with realism and panache, rarely witnessed in a cool, dark place not far from the tree, above the faded flowers, behind her new backyard, bamboo, rose, butterfly, untouched, floating, she visited and found a story. Negotiations, a whisper, captured breathless, layers of colorful hurricane brought the garden a new life, the exact location - shredded paper inside of a shoebox, buried beneath a wild wind of French satisfaction. Mesmerized, she turned to face the quiet piece of night, pen in hand, shredded paper swirling in a sparkling orb above her head.