Friday, November 8, 2019

I've been writing poetry lately


I've been writing poetry again lately, a return to my youngest writing self, some of it better than others -- and this, below, not my best. But, it's a clear and accessible poem which I'm finding I personally love lately -- something I've grown to appreciate more and more in poetry: clearness and accessibility.

Those who didn't know me when I was young, who know me from my books, may be surprised by this seeming veer toward poetry, but it's not a veer so much as a circle, and, of course, if you're paying attention, my spare prose in my published books is often more poem than dense writing (plus there is the "bird girl" from The Memory of Things who presents herself in free verse; and the whole novel in verse I just completed and was recently given a nod of approval by my agent).

So for example, this moment in my forthcoming JACK KEROUAC IS DEAD TO ME, the words in this moment, most definitely arising like a bit of poetry in my brain (and this being one of my favorite moments):


What if, instead, it had been simply arranged like this...

I liked how it felt,
to be
out of control,
a moth on a carnival ride
ready to be swept off by
the wind

At any rate, here is a poem I wrote this morning, first rough draft, totally raw and unedited* (which would need to be done after a period of walking away to truly glean what I want from it), but I am going to attempt, as I cut and paste it, to leave it that way, as I am also finding at this point in my poetry life -- coming from years of manuscript writing -- there's a big danger in overwriting. Also, you might note that this poem is part of a daily practice/writing exercise I am doing with my dear friend, and extraordinary artist/poet/photographer Lori Landau, where we each draw a line or more of inspiration from the other's prior poem. The line from her poem was "... We will find a way to dance through this darkness. . . "


Dancing Through Darkness (David Byrne, Tell Me How)


Last week, I watched you
singing and dancing through darkness,
your wild and iconic limbs alternating between
flailing and chopping 
your essence both
robotic and 
infinitely 
fluid,
your presence, electric
and electrifying.

And
I
believed.

I believed we can be
both broken 
and
hopeful,
both bleeding and
staunched,
both parched and 
bloated with artandsonganddance and the
incessantcontagiousrhythmof
per cus sion. 

I believed that light and movement and balance 
and unfiltered abandon
could both ignite
and set us (me)

free.

And, yet
(and, yet) now,
for five whole days, I have stood
paralyzed,
rhythmless,
and 
hurting,
newsfeed open,
blank “page”
impenetrable,
impenetrable,
impenetrable,
words 
absent, 
(goddamned absent)
glare of white screen
worse
than
all the
darkness.


*yep, I did make a few small edits after pasting. Mostly spacing/form edits.

Tuesday, February 26, 2019

While Supplies Last




















When I was a child my father
Would beg us:
“Girls, turn off the tap,”
claiming supplies of clean water were limited.
“Think of future generations,” he’d tell us.
“Your children. Their children.”

“But all that rain. . . ” we’d protest. . .
“A world full of oceans. . . ”
We couldn’t possibly imagine this
truth.

Now,
I stare at dirty keys,
this blank screen,
my mind troubled,
my minor thoughts
bland and
fleeting.

I write nothing.
The dog woofs, bored, at the window.

What if words
like tap water, like
clean air
actually do
run

?