Late Night Poetry

Late Night Poetry

Writing poetry
late into
the evening -
is watching dew
drip
along a window pane
down to the sill.
Like discovering
woman -
in all her glorious
beauty for the first
time.
Learning about her,
yourself,
and a spinning,
plunging universe.

As always comments are welcome.

Joe Hutchison: Poetry reading at Pomona High School 1/27/09

Maybe I'm just lucky, but I seem to be blessed recently with a couple of really cool events happening at school - all of which I had a hand in.

On Tuesday, Joseph Hutchison came to Pomona to do a poetry reading. What started as a small reading/question answer session for my creative writing club, soon became a full blown poetry reading - with roughly around fifty to sixty kids.

Joe answered some questions. Which I was really impressed with the levels of questions these students were asking. And then he finished by reading about four poems.

In asking the children after - most commented that they really enjoyed the reading. Many did make the comment that they had never been to something like that before, but would probably consider going again in the future - if another event like this arose.

I really think it was a great event. And we encouraged poetry in school - which unfortunately gets pushed to the side all to often.

Joe read one poem, that was just wonderful - he has it linked on his blog, but I will post it here as well.

City Limits
by Joseph Hutchison

for Melody

You’re like wildwood at the edge of a city.
And I’m the city: steam, sirens, a jumble
of lit and unlit windows in the night.

You’re the land as it must have been
and will be—before me, after me.
It’s your natural openness
I want to enfold me. But then
you’d become city; or you’d hide
away your wildness to save it.

So I stay within limits—city limits,
heart limits. Although, under everything,
I have felt unlimited earth. Unlimited you.

Graveyard Bed and other stuff

I went to the hospital today. Well not because I needed to - my Grandfather was in, poor fella. Anyway, it was an odd experience and I kinda felt as I was leaving that I hated it. I think it is the smell - it is hard for me to describe, but I just really don't like hospitals. Maybe I will write a poem about that.

I didn't post yesterday because I felt like if I did I would have to mention Obama and it felt cliche at that point to do so. But I am glad there is a change, lets hope it is for the better.

John Gallaher had an interesting post on his blog today - a lecture on writing and a writing exercise. I didn't think it was awesome, but it was an ok read. Check it out HERE

I am missing LOST this evening. Which is killing me that I can't see it right now. I just got back from visiting my Grandpa late and I didn't want to jump into it in the middle. So I will probably take the time to watch it tomorrow and I will most likely comment on it tomorrow as well.

And here is a poem I wrote this morning while eating breakfast. I had started thinking about this one as I was falling asleep last night (which is really dangerous because I usually forget what I was writing in my head)(I should keep a pad by my bed) and miraculously I remembered what I wanted to say this morning.

Graveyard Bed

There is a graveyard
in my bed.
Complete with two bodies.
Husband and Wife,
Side by side.
Tucked into
the blanket brown earth.
No headstones.
only heads
sawing off
open and rotten.
A willow hangs
over the communal
grave.
Gently caressing
the backs
of the face
down carcasses
with it's tender touch.

Deaf and Dead

Deaf and Dead

Step out of your
shanty
and join me
at the banks
of the Nile
We'll cast our
eyes 'bout
the Sahara
counting
one
two
counting the sands
three four
the pounding sands
five
six
to say farewell
to the deaf
and dead

As always please comment

Is this a dagger which I see before me

I have been struggling to post. I want to - I really do, but starting the new semester at school has been brutal, I haven't been writing as much and when I do write I figure I should be writing pieces of fiction since I am taking a fiction class this semester at DU - assignment deadlines and all that. So I feel somewhat guilty when I write poetry. "You should be writing fiction!" I say.

I have figured that I really am more of a poet. Or maybe I have just been writing too much poetry. I struggle writing fiction. I guess I don't want things to be long and drawn out and I usually start pieces of fiction because of an image that I see in my head, but then the image becomes drawn out, or obscured by my attempting to create a story around it. I am hoping that I will learn a lot out of this fiction class, but right now I feel stuck.

At school I am steeped in Macbeth. Prepping the play to teach my juniors. They are in for a treat. I have some cool stuff planned for this one. It has been a long time since I read Macbeth and I had forgotten how cool this play really is. It is a very timely play as well.

And at last a poem - wrote this one while my students were doing a timed writing exercise.

Untitled - extra credit for help with a title

I descended into the earth
and found a chasm.
A hand, withered
and rotting,
reached forth.
It handed
me a book.
The title was obscured.
I read it.
It was good.
I would have returned
to you
to relate the tale,
but it was already
dark and
the boatman
kept waving me
forward.

As always comments are welcomed

Strike Sparks by Sharon Olds

I recently re-discovered Sharon Olds. I had read some of her work in a poetry class at BYU-Idaho and then promptly forgot about her. It was my Poetry class this last fall that reminded me of her. She really is wonderful.

I just finished Strike Sparks - one of her collections of selected poetry and I must say it was good stuff... for the most part. Some of the poems seemed to be repetitive. The same ideas over and over. But then some were just awe inspiring, beautiful, poignant, powerful. This is one of my favorite from the collection.

The Language of the Brag
Sharon Olds

I have wanted excellence in the knife-throw,
I have wanted to use my exceptionally strong and accurate arms
and my straight posture and quick electric muscles
to achieve something at the centre of a crowd,
the blade piercing the bark deep,
the haft slowly and heavily vibrating like the cock.

I have wanted some epic use for my excellent body,
some heroism, some American achievement
beyond the ordinary for my extraordinary self,
magnetic and tensile, I have stood by the sandlot
and watched the boys play.

I have wanted courage, I have thought about fire
and the crossing of waterfalls, I have dragged around

my belly big with cowardice and safely,
my stool black with iron pills,
my huge breasts oozing mucus,
my legs swelling, my hands swelling,
my face swelling and darkening, my hair
falling out, my inner sex
stabbed again and again with terrible pain like a knife.
I have lain down.

I have lain down and sweated and shaken
and passed blood and feces and water and
slowly alone in the centre of a circle I have
passed the new person out
and they have lifted the new person free of the act
and wiped the new person free of that
language of blood like praise all over the body.

I have done what you wanted to do, Walt Whitman,
Allen Ginsberg, I have done this thing,

I and the other women this exceptional
act with the exceptional heroic body,
this giving birth, this glistening verb,
and I am putting my proud American boast
right here with the others.

I love that third to last stanza. "I have lain down and sweated and shaken/and passed blood and feces and water and/slowly alone in the centre of a circle I have/passed the new person out/and they have lifted the new person free of the act/and wiped the new person free of that/language of blood like praise all over the body./" Such a wonderful way of describing child birth.