7th Follower Muw ha ha

Only five more followers and I will have my apocalyptic twelve. Then we will let loose the hounds of destruction! J/k

Thanks goes out to Mary Biddinger for becoming a follower. I have been reading her blog the word cage for a while. I enjoy her ideas, perspective and photographs. Some sharp stuff going on there. Thanks for linking up my blog on your site as well.

Here is a poem for y'all

I'm not what you wanted

I’m
not what you wanted
No
Not me
Never me
I mean
I read/write poetry
for heaven’s sake

Not what you had planned
Not the athlete
throwing a pass
making a basket

But me
ended up with me
instead
Do I regret?
No
Not me
Never me
I’m
not what you wanted

And once again any comments would be helpful.

Womb and a couple other things

I do have a poem today - the wife and kid went out so I have the house to myself and am able to post earlier than ten o'clock at night. But I also wanted to link some stuff and talk about some other stuff.

First - I am a huge comic book fan and my homepage is a site called Newsarama, which is essentially comic book news throughout the day. One of my favorite artists Ethan VanSciver has a weekly column entitled "Your time is now mine" and usually they are just strange musings and only mildly entertaining. Today's column was downright hilarious. Several times I found myself laughing out loud. It is on the subject of drawing and how we all begin drawing when we are young and some of us grow out of it and others do not. Anyway here is a link to it HERE

Second - I have been following Mary Biddinger's blog the word cage for a couple weeks. Earlier in December she posted an entry about taking our poetry inventory, or poetic accounting as I have been calling it - with myself. It's an interesting post check it out HERE. Anyway, last night I finally got around to taking my own poetry inventory. I divided my poems into three lists FINISHED POEMS, UNFINISHED POEMS, and SUBMITTED POEMS. I found that I have far more poems that are what I consider unfinished or still working on than I previously thought. With only 9 poems in my finished list and about 25 in my unfinished list. I guess some revision and work shopping of these poems is in order. It was good to take a minute to do some organization though. I now know where my poems stand and know where they are on my computer.

Third - the poem. And yes I have had several pregnant students. This has been a subject that has interested me time and again. I have three poems which are similar. This one I crafted most recently.

Womb

She barely squeezes
into her desk –
three rows in and four
back.
Her ripe belly
ready to burst
pomegranate red.
Soon a cry,
tears of joy.

I lecture –
ancient texts – classics:
Chaucer, Shakespeare,
Milton, Beowulf.
Expanded Canon:
Steinbeck, Salinger.
She doesn’t care.
Purple I-Pod to
her escape.
Eyes full of hate,
pain, sorrow.

But what of her child?
That swollen seed she bears.
Does this germ
of a student
now appreciate literature?
A grand violinist before
a London audience?
Brilliant scientists gazing
into a microscope?
Or the star quarterback
Throwing a game winning
Pass?
Like your bum of a father –
unwilling to acknowledge
your presence.

As with most of my poems - I am still drafting this one so comments are welcome.

The Import of Drawing

William Michaelian - wonderful poet turned me on to the idea of drawing to force a poem. Well perhaps force is not the best word. I have been trying it - here and there and have thus added to my office several pieces of horrendous artwork and a couple of poems to work on. Here is my first attempt at drawing the poem and the poem that resulted. They have no connection, except for the act of drawing.

The Import of Drawing

I used
to draw in pencil.
Fearing my smudge.
Erasing mistakes,
misgivings.
Now I sketch with a
fine tipped plump
black
marker.
A new urgency
attends my scrawlings –
a desire to leave
a lasting mark.


Please comment as this poem is still being drafted

Dreams of Flame

Dreams of Flame

I dream,
bright, blue flames.
Which consume,
ignite,
and deliver sodden
birth.

As I dream,
I am lying on a bed
in a hospital
psychiatric ward.
The building burns around us.

How delicious - a charcoal death.

Welcome New Follower

A big welcome to I'm Just Only Me - thanks for joining the partay.

I'm's blog is linked up in my blog section or you can check it out here

http://caughtinthedawning.blogspot.com/

Two Poems Today

Here are two poems I drafted yesterday while my students were taking finals. Please comment.

Winter Moon

O winter moon
if only warmth
issued from
your sinews

rather than
biting cold, darkness,
and death.

---------------------------

Untitled - suggestions for a title would be greatly appreciated

My son naps,
like a curled
feline,
in a three foot
by five and a half
section
of warmed carpet.

Super-heated by a
welcomed
winter sun.

Melting the
stabbing icicles
and providing
blanket heat
for my child.

While Standing in Line at the Post Office

While Standing in Line at the Post Office

reading

selected

poetry in

holiday postal

traffic

a quick glance

from this marvelous

bit of personification

reveals

an old man rifled by

Lou Gehrig’s

disease

his tender

hands clutching

a pile

of Christmas correspondence

he looses hold

and the letters

sprinkle down

like a brief

holiday snow

Library Books

Library Books

I sincerely
apologize
for writing
in library books.

Not my property.

But at the time,
while my soul
knit tight
with the words,
and then all at once -
I connected with
the author,
editor,
my mother,
the president of the chess club,
and then
all of humanity.

It was so beautiful that I cried.
I just had to write the poem.

Please comment - this poem is still in drafting.

New Follower

Thanks to vazambam for following my blog. I have been following his for a while - you can find the link in my blogs section on the right. Great poetry there - check it out.

Luljeta Lleshanaku's FRESCO

On Joe Hutchison's recommendation, I recently read and finished Fresco by Luljeta Lleshanaku. Joe's comments will be more insightful and thorough than mine will be. You can read them here.

Her poetry is beautiful, as is her story. Many of her poems have an almost childlike quality - her voice is so fresh and new, her eye for details and observations on the world are gorgeous.

I would have to say my favorite in the whole collection is "Self-Defense"

SELF-DEFENSE
by Luljeta Lleshanaku

"Confined
to a tent of soldiers
who will never return home.
If you try to leave
you will step on the bodies
sleeping beside you.

You have nowhere to go.
The stars
those witches' fingernails
stir your destiny through the fog.

In the corner
among ashes
you count the holes in your old blanket.
You breathe in bits of everyone's dreams.
Like an iceberg you ignore all borders.

While in your blodd
surprisingly enough
the leukocytes multiply."

Maybe I'm just morbid, but this is beautiful, almost tragic.

So check out Luljeta Lleshanaku

Thank You

Thanks to everyone who has begun to follow my blog. I am still new at this whole blogging thing, but have been enjoying it. It seems to be a good way to force me to write something almost everyday - because I want to post up on the blog.

And a big shout to Joel Jacobson who began following the blog today. Check him out at

http://jejacobson.wordpress.com/

Once again thanks everybody.

Untitled

If anyone can think of a title for this one - extra credit points for you.

the slide of my shadow
settling
upon your peaceful,
asleep facade

the pain you feel
I know -
the heartache
I understand -

you break your front
seemingly startled awake
you smile at me
omniscient
your smirk
a handwritten personalized
invitation

To the spider by my bathtub drain

To the spider by my
bathtub drain,
get out quick!
Don't you know
the deluge is coming?

Crayon Nebulous

Sometimes my son scribbles in my notebooks.
Circular loops
coming together in a crayon
epicenter

A new universe
in my notepad.

I wonder
at the genius
his tiny
hands have sired.

And I help him
sign and date
at the bottom.

I welcome any comments - still in the drafting phase on this one

Two Bit

TwoBit
Take a gander at this old bastard.
Tattooed – covering arm
back wrist.
Names of his children penned
into pink flesh.
His long gray matted beard
falls into steaming stew.
He curses and pulls the tips
out.
They cut the ends off – because he doesn’t care any,
this old bastard.
He wears a kilt (and a t-shirt
that says “Screw
You” in bold white on black lettering)
in the frigid Canadian
morning air.
And marches with his brothers
in honored Scottish
procession.
Ain’t he beautiful?

I play video games quite often - on the internet. And in the midst of my gaming I met a guy from Canada who uses the handle Twobit in game. He recently posted pictures from the Scottish festival he attended. It inspired me to write this poem.

Poem this morning

While Eating Generic Rice Krispies

The snows have come again
and for a brief moment I am
starring at a blank canvas.
The vehicles parked out in
front
covered with a blanket
of powder.

Later,
the children will begin
their lazy trails - erecting
men of ice.
Nibbling on the snacks
that will become
emotion.
Listening to the drop/splash
of a melting orchestra

The couple below us
will push their two
into the cold.
The younger immediately will
join the frolic.
The elder
first-born son
will hug the brick -
watching the melt
of the icicles above.
Till one breaks
and falls
into a pillow down white

Un-shattered he
now owns a
crystal dagger - for a time.

I am not set on the title. And I do still want to play around with this - revise it. But I enjoy some of the images. Please Comment

Poetry Magazine Dec. 08

I finished reading the latest issue of Poetry last night, while watching House. This is my first year as a subscriber and I am still luke warm about the publication. Some months the magazine is filled with poems that I "get," and am inspired by. Other months it if filled with trash. And not just normal, run of the mill trash. Elitist trash.

This issue was in the middle. Some of the poems were really quite good - Todd Boss' "This Morning in a Morning Voice," and "Don't Be Flip,"; Nick Beer's "Prairie Octopus, Awake"; Michael Rutherglen's "Lives of the Watchmakers"; Roger Reeves' "Cymothoa Exiqua"; Caki Wilkinson's "Lares and Penates" and finally, Alison Stine's "School" and "After the Party." - And some were not good at all. Hard to understand.

I think my favorite poem from this issue was "School" by Alison Stine. I enjoyed the images and feelings expressed by it. The raw, lovesick, emotions conveyed by writing poems in school. The image of the girl sitting next to the speaker - picking her scabs - ahhh it is just beautiful and sick. Why does she have scabs? So much in so little.

I usually don't read the comment or letters to the editor sections of this publication, but I have been searching for non-fiction texts for my Juniors (as they prep for the ACT) and I started reading "Branches: A Notebook" by Fanny Howe. I haven't finished it, and I don't know if it will prove fruitful. But it is the first of the commentary - non poetic - pieces that Poetry publishes that I have begun reading.

Overall, I would say a good issue. Probably worth picking up - if you don't already have a subscription.

I've been thinking about this for quite a while.

I took Poetry: The Voice Within this Fall semester at DU. The course was taught by the inspiring Joe Hutchinson and during the course I stumbled upon his blog and that of several other writers. I did some investigating and discovered that blogging has its merits. I had always thought of it as people who had either too much time on their hands or families that wanted to share pictures of junior.

In my case, both may be true.

This blog will be a mixture of a lot of different things. I would like to share my writing with others from this venue. But I would also like to discuss things that interest me. Video games, comic books and miniature war gaming will frequently fill my posts. Most of all I hope that this will be a nice springboard for my writing. If I can be dutiful and write here often, perhaps it will turn into an excercise before I get the really serious writing.