Painful

The poetry open mic reading at Kieran’s pub felt like watching a bike slide across the ice and the rider, bloody and mangled, begin to struggle to their feet only to have an SUV pulverize them.  The first poem started out travelling smoothly, but it went too far, drove a little too fast and subsequently crashed in the middle of its track across the road.  The concept of the first poem intrigued me, taking Poe’s The Raven but instead creating a humorous, modern, and erotic poem.  The rhythm and meter followed that of Poe’s work, forming an interestingly patterned and flowing poem.  However, I found the poem took its sexual theme to an extreme, perhaps for shock value or because the author couldn’t think of any other rhymes.  This caused it to become uncomfortable, not only for me, who feels awkward easily, but for most of the people in that room.  The bike had hit an icy patch, but it still had an opportunity to save itself before it wiped out.  The next poem does not merit classification as such.  A man stood before a regretfully open mic and ranted.  Unfortunately, open mics do not have rules in place for the revoking of poetry rights, something new I learned that night.  If terrible, distressingly illiterate writers wish to speak for five, or tragically, ten minutes, they cannot be stopped.  The bike had slipped into a tangled mess that nobody wants to witness, but the watcher cannot avert their eyes.  The night ended with a long prose poem that bordered significantly on the side of story.  The poem captured my attention with hopeful potential.  I believed for a moment this bike could still drive away, and took the time to appreciate the cozy, book filled room, the dark wood implying a severity and competency that none of the poems so far had encompassed.  I sipped on the lemonade I ordered because the reading took place in a bar.  My personal experience, sitting on a cushioned bench, enjoying my lemonade with crunchable and properly bit sized ice, found no issue, but the discomfort came from sympathetic embarrassment.  Witnessing a room full of one speaker, crashing in slow motion, while the rest of the onlookers cringe in their shared distress did not live up to my idea of a quiet, sincere and intellectual poetry evening as envisioned when I entered the library-esque back room of this polite little pub.  Suffice to say, the last story-poem suddenly turned cliché and difficult to follow, as the SUV of poetry standards leered above the floundering reading and drove straight over it, similar to the fate of the endearing puppy in the final poem.

Lies

The seductive simplicity

Appeals to the practical,

The insignificance, how can it be wrong

If it matters so little, the honey coated

Words wrapped neatly in smooth silver,

Pleasantly crinkled paper, presented

On a platter, delivering exactly

The truth they want, how is it harmful

To provide the harmonious, hoped for

Response, no need to complicate

With dissident complaints,

After all, the talent to deliver

These candies perfectly wrapped

With anecdotal details, the flavor

Personalized for each of us,

Some prefer white, petty, innocent,

They say it’s not healthy, but

The indulgence tastes as sweet

As chocolate, smooth, innocuous,

Sates your hunger, and you’re good

At it, not just any store bought,

Not everyone provides such

Polite service, smiles innocently,

You know you want to hear these

Well crafted, thoughtful, homemade

Lies, sometimes, there is an

Aftertaste, but if you try just

One more, it goes away.

Grandmothers

The room filled in your name, bustling children, grandchildren,

Their fast conversations vivacious crescendos, but your presence

Barely sustains, it seems as if you take less space with each rattling

Breath, you leave early and the bubbling, roiling energy reclaims

The vacancy in seconds, after you gingerly bestow a present with

Crooked claw hands, but a shaking fumble later, the box bends

On thick carpet and maroon blood blossoms below your transparent

Skin, ghost skin, crinkled over darkening pools, almost a surreal

Memory already, like the other grandmother, of whom my impressions lie

Foggy with the wear of time, pulling mere reflections from the surface

Of a once sea, acrid perfume of cigarettes, curiously stiff hair,

Soft eyes, overlarge as my father’s, staring out from a startling

Photograph, this woman I never consider, long packed into stuffy

Attics of ancient memories like the corroded silver jewelry eagerly

Snatched from drawers she no longer needed, soon forgotten by chaotic

Children, now of all places I see that face alongside the other

Grandmother, ironically among a celebration of age, yet the aged

Here shocks me with fragility, the resounding fall of the tightly wrapped

Gift calling attention to twisted fingers, the outlines of meager bones,

Hollow bones, mirroring the traces of thickening joints and spider hands

Of my mother, the nonlinear curve of my own pinky, as thin below supple

Skin so unlike my parchment genetic destiny, and now, holding

Ice on her lurid bruise growing like fungus, vainly trying to stem

This burgeoning weakness, I remember the other, unlined face that never

Will appear at its own eightieth birthday party but smiles jauntily from

The muted photograph with a permanent fortitude, unchanging youth.

Weakness

You offered

Your sympathy, supersaturated syrup,

Poison to flesh imbued over years

With self reliance, self dependence, self

Pity, so if I cringe

At the self inflicted idea

That I am somehow weaker, that I cannot

Fix my own problems without salt stains

Down wet cheeks, I’m sorry, thank you

For asking but I will recover, I will not make this mistake again,

I cannot be another girl begging for help from stronger men,

As my body betrays me, the one that shakes

With surprised fear while you keep walking,

The treasonous weakness of my skin amongst the cold,

Submitting to the elements, or sordid exhaustion,

I cannot prevent these involuntary

Reactions that destroy cautiously created

Independence, the way I cannot reach

My sparring partner, practicing karate with

A man six feet two, I take an extra step, punch

With inconsequential force, the teacher nods assent,

My incomparable strength

Is not my fault,

It’s in my nature.

Final Project Proposal

I would like to create a single craft book with illustrations of about 15 to 20 of my poems.  I will not center on a common theme but work currently on more poems with a narrative, descriptive feel.  I will plan on placing my book in a public location, perhaps a coffee shop.

Opossum

A barely perceptible thud

Jarring me more than its size merits,

The searing second image, two glossy eyes

Ghostly white in unforgiving headlights,

Scrutinizing the silent passenger who sits,

Stares back for this heartbeat but next finds

No eyes staring back, gone in an illustrious,

Imagined second, now the idea of surreal

Intimacy haunts, the specter twisted under

Wheels, waiting in sticky blood for the next car

To maul already matted fur, this car, hurtling

Murder weapon has long passed, no marks,

Not even a stain of that crimson life I saw

So vividly in the rearview mirror, verifying

That opossum were ever there, ever stared,

Ever died in the moonlit road to Iowa,

I checked the merciless metal, but nothing

Was left, so unlike the brutal screeching,

Scratching impact of reckless humans seeking

Insurance scam payouts, the greed leaving behind

Broken metal, scarred side doors, angry shouts,

A thud reverberating, but here along the quiet

Highway a white, silent creature strays too far

Into the unstoppable path of another violent

Car, slips under, and we keep driving.

Melody

Close your eyes, the music will still play

It leaves your fingers to become surreal company,

Distinguished entity to join your lonesome hands

Connected to smooth machines of mystical ability,

Who created this perfect formulation, who decided

They could bend the trees into sound that pleases,

Almost deity, the physicality of this transformation

From an obscure language across creased pages

Into human flesh that surprises itself with each

Melody emerging, the tangible portrait of identity,

I have seen the numbers, mathematical proofs,

Neuroscience explanation of the fascination simple

Notes compel within our wired heads, and yet

An essence incontrovertible, unnamable emerges

From the fluttering cocoon of my dancing bow,

Why else would I set down the phone describing

What is irrevocably lost to sit down before inanimate

Keys and play the first melody I remember, this song,

Springing from me as if cued as messenger, the act of

Creating draws me back into humanity, into a peace

Of listening, letting this fantastical creature comfort me,

Haunting ghosts of imagination, when one note vibrates

We can hear the harmonic chords, the invisible presence

Of sequences falling into place, the periodic waves

Deceiving brains into believing an excess noise, invaluable

In this world of excess noise, I find words unnecessary,

Because I can envision infinite, self realized expressions

Within this peculiar cacophony of unknown reality,

Speaking inaudible secrets of unequaled capacity, Chomsky

Would find, I think, this wordless language lies as inherent

In our nature as vocalization, the personification

Of ancient harmony, constant in inconstancy, I cannot

Fathom what you hear, but I hear compassion, silence,

A universal will to share the possibilities of this, of any melody.