Not all my poetry is about thoughts or feelings or other denizens of the insubstantial world. Sometimes there's not much mystery to what I'm saying at all.
I was at a second hand store looking through their collection of books when I noticed a spine that was really intriguing. It was an odd paper, for one, hardcover and small. I pulled it off the shelf and noticed it's title and that there was a script in another language around that, and thought I'd stumbled upon a really neat find.
Even though it wasn't quite as I expected, I bought it anyway. And there it sits on my shelf - but I'm not going to read it. Click'er and take a listen to find out why - and why I bought it anyway.
I have a real interest in things that aren't seen. I mean, really, most of what affects us in our lives is totally invisible; other's emotional responses to us, the thoughts that compel them, what might have happened earlier in their day, what might be rolling through their minds as we're interacting, the actions of our governments or lawmakers, the incidental decisions made by people we will never meet or know that they exist that directly affect us. The myriad of things going on around us that we're just not aware of is legion. And of course, we add to that mess with our own unspoken desires, feelings, the things we keep to ourselves. We're all lakes, big or small, with things on the bottom of them.
But there's also a real envy I have for things like stones. They just are. 'Life' for them isn't complex. There's no catastrophes, broken hearts or hurt feelings. Sure, I guess there's not much else either - but there is eternity. If stones have some kind of consciousness, as certain traditions might think, it might not be a bad existence. And sometimes I envy it, even if I feel a certain communion based solely on a similar isolation as that muck-stuck stone.
So this poem is about feeling, about the unknown, about how the hidden things are all around us. I'd love to sit on the bottom of a lake for a few days or weeks if I could. Wouldn't you?
So hopefully I maintain some posting-regularity here. In an attempt, I'm going to add a few more over the next couple of days.
This one is a recent re-write. The bones and guts were there for a while, but it needed some healthy pink flesh, and this is the outcome. It was basically inspired by a nap; I had gone to lay down with a specific question in mind, one I had been bouncing around for a while - set my alarm, and took 40 winks. Woke up to the very beginning of a song that is really about truth and accurate vision, in a sense. Go look for it if you like, maybe some of you even know it. But what it did for me was answer that question without really answering it; almost like using a parable to explain a complex issue, it made me think in a way that helped me realize a truth that I might not have seen before or without - and that's exactly how God, the universe, our 'collective unconscious' works, little co-incidental nudges that say, "hey, pay attention," work - whichever of those you believe in. And that's what this poem is really about, paying attention.
Oh, and by the by... I'm working on cleaning up the crackly endings. Working with a new recorder, so bear with me.
Wow - welcome back to the author! After - can it be? - a full year of not posting a damned thing, here I am, back and ready to read some more of my favourite pieces of work to you, Dear Listener, should you still check the place out once in a while.
I guess blogging is like anything; it's not the source. You might be one of those folks who spend days reading and watching news, keeping up-to-date on politics and social problems, writing MPs, or Congressmen, or whatever other rat-bastard-like is running your local neck of the woods, and maybe even going out and tacking up posters or marching, megaphone aloft and solidarity echoing above the heads of those around you; but all that work and effort makes you forget about your blog about activism, because let's face it, blogging isn't the source - it's the secondary.
So don't think I'm not out there everyday, keeping a watchful eye, lying naked in the rain, or under a full moon, sticking my hands in the muck of a marsh just to feel the ooze, helping a worm to the far side of the sidewalk, watching strangers in my local coffee shop, whispering on the corner about the end of the world or sitting downtown with a coffee contemplating the Meaning of Life - I'm still a poet, even if I don't spew evidence of such online.
So here's my re-introduction to the secondary that is this site - the showcase, perhaps, is a better term. Fresh from the mud-slogging, naked-in-the-rain-lying, worm-assisting, moon-worshipping that is the source of all of this, I bring to you Pacific Coast.
It is currently one of my most favourite works. It's got layers, is the thing. Often, I select an image or an idea to address, or a couple - in this piece there are so many questions left the reader. What is the thing I'm talking with? Is it the car, or me? Why is the fuel tank full but the thing's in neutral? When will this whole thing end and just what the hell is the whole metaphor about, anyway? Well, answer them however you like - that's the best part of this kind of thing - I ain't going to tell you, and yours is as valid as mine anyway. Hope you enjoy.
This is one of those poems that popped onto the page during a troubling time in my life. I had been out of sorts for a while; long-shelved feelings for a girl were beginning to bloom again in their tiny emotional mason jars. It's that way whenever you really love someone and they seem unavailable. You can do your best to put those feelings away, and ignoring them isn't always difficult, but sometimes there's nothing you can do and you hear the lids creaking as the pressure inside builds.
But it's a calm place. You know you're going to start feeling those pangs of love-sick soon enough, but for now the soon-to-be blown jars haven't messed the closet and there's nothing to clean up; you're just waiting to hear that shatter of glass, mop and bucket ready. This is Nagasaki.
I wrote this a while ago, but it's still cherry. A fun little poem about a harmless monster who takes what isn't his - but leaves behind a gift much more wonderful than what he takes away. I have to admit to having been given the first line as a writing assignment - create something, prose or poetry, out of this, "the grungy grog groveled before his gouty king". Well, here's what I spun out of that opener. Hope you enjoy.
I've always loved the poetry of Robert Service. In my third year poetry course at university, I got teased when I said he was my favourite poet. Mind you, my tastes have expanded and I count Frost, Dickinson, Rumi, Cohen and many more as faves - but I'll always have a special place in my heart for the verse of Service.
I've written a few pieces in his style; one that I've long-since lost and haven't had the courage to write again, and another that I present to you today - the Ballad of the Wendigo.
The Wendigo is a native-American spirit, a cannibal, a wind spirit, a tormentor of souls lost in the Northern woods. This is the story of an ill-conceived hunt for revenge, and the sorry shame that one man will forever carry with him; two friends dead and nothing gained but a sad truth that he shares with those sitting around him in the bar, having returned from an unnecessary if successful hunt. Hope you enjoy.
