ive been terrible about writing, wonderful about reading these days. helped by my new completely self-serving idea of posting a poem-a-day as my gchat away message. at first i stuck to safe old-slipper-poems i loved and now ive accumulated a number of sites that i troll through for new blood and fresh meat is what ive found.
sink your teeth into this puppy.
surprisingly appropriate to my state of mind/life as well...
Cause and Effect
It's because the earth continues to wobble on its axis
that we continue to stumble down the streets of the heart.
It's because of the loneliness of the first cell trying to swim
through its primordial pool that we are filled with a kind of
galactic fear. For example: one moment a rocket falls
capriciously into a square. Another moment, a rogue wave
turns over the fishing boat whose crew leaves their memories
floating like an oil slick that never reaches shore.
In this way we understand our dying loves scratching at the door.
In this way, each love creates its own theory of pain. Each love
gnaws the derelict hours to the bone. But because there are
so many blank spaces in history we still have time
to write our own story. Wittgenstein said our words have
replaced our emotions. He never understood how
we have to cleanse ourselves of these invisible parasites
of doubt and fear. We might as well worry about
the signals from dead worlds wandering around the universe
forever. Think instead of how the trees prop up the sky.
How the rain falls into the open eyes of the pond
bringing a vision no one expected. Here's mine: this bee
hovering over the pencil seems to bring a message from
the deepest flowers you inhabit. Because I don't know
where all this love has come from, because the clouds are
covered with our footsteps that know no time, I am
no longer surprised when each day comes from a new place,
because in this way, I can imagine these words getting lost
in your lungs, my fingers curling inside you as if I could
gather you inside my own heart, or tracing the slope of your hip
towards a whole other world. Don't worry. Like us the planet
wobbles because of the shifting hot and cold zones, high
and low pressures, the pull of tides. The stars that are
these words are always closer than we think despite
the theories of astronomers. In this way, I will always be there,
a rain falling into the sea, the abandoned light opening your eyes
despite the curtains of reason, the life you give each time
you turn to me, because the stumbling breaths we borrow
from each other are all we have to keep each other alive.
by Richard Jackson
4.24.2009
the perfect poem for the day. love it when that happens.
UPSIDE THE MORNING
by Mark Terrill
I catch myself catching myself
standing in the garden
in the throes of thinking
if it's beauty that gets a hold on us
or us that gets a hold on beauty.
Compared to the tiny green bug
crawling down my arm
my metaphysical ineptitude
is about the size of a small car.
I look over toward the shed
and see you standing there
tending to your seedlings
with almost unconscious devotion,
framed in an opening in the trees,
now uppity lush and leafy green
in the first burst of spring,
backlit and gloriously golden-edged
by the morning sun, like some kind of
highly charged radiant fauvist miracle,
and can't help but wonder just who
has a hold on what.
4.21.2009
Time
when i have it, i read it.
i miss the NYT so bad its like a friend i used to talk to every day who ive been delinquent about keeping in touch with and now am just too ashamed to pick up the damn phone... yes i like the headlines but i LOVE the smaller stories. today i got up in enough time not only to make it to WORK ontime but also to get a bagel with cream cheese and coffee and DAMN am i ready for the day. breakfast is a beautiful thing:
and here are two stories that made me happy and made me remember how great our president is, even if hes been under the gun lately-and will continue to be so increasingly.
Story One - about the letters obama gets, reads, responds to... i know hes just a man puts on his pants the way we all do but i still think if i actually got within hand shaking distance of our president, i would weep.
Story Two - not a story but the pulitzer prize winning photos by NYT photographer Damon Winter. You think youve seen every great photo of obama. and then there are these.
4.20.2009
poetry stoned still treading water
friday i busted ass out of work at 5 oclock which is really about three hours too early for the amount of work i had left on my plate-which im now feeling completely overwhlemed by and ignoring quite effectively- but it was well worth it as it allowed me to arrive in concord NH two hours later, just in time to hear sharon olds and philip shultz and wes mcnair read their glorious poetry. i sometimes wonder where my salary is going, after all im not spending money on clothes (im going naked this spring unless i invest a little in some new work clothes) or shnazy computer gadgets (my computer currently holds 0 charge, it has to be plugged in or else it instantly dies. i.e. its a desktop laptop) or even expensive music tickets (ive only been going to local venues and small deals)so where the hell does it go? and then i realize that for this ten dollar ticket i didnt think twice about spending the money to park in the city all day to save time getting there, burnt through a tank and a half of gas by going about 90 mph when i finally extracted myself from the boston mass-exodus traffic, bought a copy of each of the poets newest books because i want my life be full of their kind of brilliance and also they were all there to sign the damn things so really, how could i resist??
lets just say the event cost me more than ten dollars in the end. but again, so worth it. especially since i met D, father of M, in concord, who happened to be friends with sharon olds partner and that happened to mean i happened to be able to speak to her for longer than the average book signing would allow though im pretty sure i barely muttered ten poetry-stoned words and three of them were "i'm in pr" which really is the least attractive thing i can say about myself at this point. D did step in quickly to talk about my plays, which is very kind of him. he is a loyal fan of mine even if i dont deserve it these days since i can barely remember what dialogue looks like, nevermind how its written.
in fact seeing D was possibly as poetic as the reading. he took me out to dinner at a thai place around the corner after the reading and i got something called 'golden bags' that were really delicious and crunchy and not baggy at all. and then we talked about my career his career poetry playwriting politics nature travel healthcare technology religion and pretty much everything we could discuss except M. i appreciated that although M was present in his dads engulging hugs pensive pauses goofy gestures skeptical head tilts and twinkling impish eyes. the resemblance between them is intense, it goes beyond physicality, it was disorienting as hell. the only reason i was able to wait until i got back to the car to burst into tears is that D was sensitive enough to know that the space between me being pulled together and me being a complete wreak was the time it took to say his sons name outloud.
i have done a damn good job of pretending i do not miss him as much as i do. i have kept myself distracted in every way thinkable. through work, music, art, volunteering and most of all, other love interests. it hasnt been for him, its been for me and its been wonderful. i love my life in a totally new way. it feels exclusively mine, unlike college where it belonged first to my parents and second to my school and maybe third to me. in a way its all worked. i have been too busy and happy to spend more than a passing moment worrying where he is and whether i will talk to him some time soon. and by getting involved with other people, particularly other women- who have kept things especially interesting- ive managed to eliminate loneliness and the need for validation that i will fully admit exist in me and are the weaknesses i assumed would keep me clinging to M.
but even after surrounding myself with what felt like an impermeable wall of people and purpose and time, i go to his hometown and see him in his father and feel as skinless as i did six months ago.
i think its safe to say that he wont read this. hes somewhere deep in mexico on a truck or a bike or whatever vehicle is carrying him towards the rest of his life. i just hope im right that slow as its going i'm actually moving towards my own destination too, not splitting the difference between his path and mine and ending up in the middle of nowhere.
4.10.2009
i was going to share a link with you
now i need to share the entier conversation that just occurred between me and the coworkers as a result of this link because it made me laugh SO HARD
me: a friend just sent me a link to a blog of just pictures of signs that improperly use quotation marks.
vanessa: who did?
me: a friend.
vanessa: ben? who's ben?
me: a friend!
ellen: ooooh who's ben?
me: A. FRIEND.
vanessa: oh. i was going to say. whats "ben" short for?
me:...what the hell could ben possibly be short for?
vanessa: benjamina?
ellen: benita?
vanessa: bellen?
ellen: benessa?
me: are you two done?
vanessa: benla?
me: now youre just making shit up.
(ellen comes into my cube)
ellen: dooze im meeting my husband after work and i want to convince him to let me get a cleaning lady so i dont have to do it. i know i'm not your type but if i were, would you say this shirt makes me look seductive?
me: seriously?
ellen: what? now you can tell us if we look hot! and not in that youre-my-friend-so-youre-hot-to-me shit.
vanessa: i never thought of that. sweet. god youre so useful, dooze.
4.08.2009
handholding
very very cool about vermont. i would have been appalled had they gone the other way. and iowa rose a few places on my smart-state list as a result of that hail mary.
im feeling contrary - i was in a sunny mood yesterday, when it was rainy, and today, when its gorgeous, i feel like theres a little black cloud travelling over me.
i think its partially because i'm obliged to be inside so when its gross out at least i feel like im not missing anything. but on days like today i wonder why in the world im doing this job when it doesnt stand for anything i care about or require the creative side of my brain/honest part of my heart AND it traps me in this maze of cubicles that i sincerely believe is a level of hell even dante could not have imagined.
so then i whine to my boss that we should have class outside and she tells me im fired for the third time that day but then takes me for a walk with me and talks about how she- wise, witty and wonderful woman that she is- landed in this position and why she chose to stay and asks me what i really truly want to accomplish with my life and i tell her about my cafe-bookstore-bar-poet/songwriter-open-mic-artist-haven that i intend to create and she nods wisely and says that i'll know when i've taken everything from this job that i need and then it will be time to make a move.
so then im reminded that im here because i love the people i work with. and i feel better.
last night i spent wandering davis square with a lovely dear friend from dartmouth who i met under such unusual circumstances: she played me in my play. and ever since weve felt joined in very specific artistic creative soulful ways. last night we ate cupcakes of lemon and ginger and i showed her my gay cafe and then we went to the rosebud diner, all of twenty feet long with a cash register thats neon-lit and stools with split busted leather tops and a waitress with a voice like a lifer-smoker and the motto of "eat and get out" but we charmed her and sat in the corner booth for two hours eating our thick cut vinegar adn sea salt fries while i explained that id gone off men, perhaps the way one stops eating mozzarella after youve gone to the S of italy and eaten it pracitcally out of the cows udder and then she explained how she was in love with two men who were both too lost to love her back the way she needed too and then we wrapped our heads in scarves like babushkas and held freezing hands all the way home and i realized how fucking fantastic it is that our lives crossed in this creative way as it is fantastic that my life has crossed with everyone who understands me better than i undertand myself.
im a lucky girl.
amen.
im feeling contrary - i was in a sunny mood yesterday, when it was rainy, and today, when its gorgeous, i feel like theres a little black cloud travelling over me.
i think its partially because i'm obliged to be inside so when its gross out at least i feel like im not missing anything. but on days like today i wonder why in the world im doing this job when it doesnt stand for anything i care about or require the creative side of my brain/honest part of my heart AND it traps me in this maze of cubicles that i sincerely believe is a level of hell even dante could not have imagined.
so then i whine to my boss that we should have class outside and she tells me im fired for the third time that day but then takes me for a walk with me and talks about how she- wise, witty and wonderful woman that she is- landed in this position and why she chose to stay and asks me what i really truly want to accomplish with my life and i tell her about my cafe-bookstore-bar-poet/songwriter-open-mic-artist-haven that i intend to create and she nods wisely and says that i'll know when i've taken everything from this job that i need and then it will be time to make a move.
so then im reminded that im here because i love the people i work with. and i feel better.
last night i spent wandering davis square with a lovely dear friend from dartmouth who i met under such unusual circumstances: she played me in my play. and ever since weve felt joined in very specific artistic creative soulful ways. last night we ate cupcakes of lemon and ginger and i showed her my gay cafe and then we went to the rosebud diner, all of twenty feet long with a cash register thats neon-lit and stools with split busted leather tops and a waitress with a voice like a lifer-smoker and the motto of "eat and get out" but we charmed her and sat in the corner booth for two hours eating our thick cut vinegar adn sea salt fries while i explained that id gone off men, perhaps the way one stops eating mozzarella after youve gone to the S of italy and eaten it pracitcally out of the cows udder and then she explained how she was in love with two men who were both too lost to love her back the way she needed too and then we wrapped our heads in scarves like babushkas and held freezing hands all the way home and i realized how fucking fantastic it is that our lives crossed in this creative way as it is fantastic that my life has crossed with everyone who understands me better than i undertand myself.
im a lucky girl.
amen.
4.01.2009
fuck. it doesn't get any better than this:
Loneliness
So many different kinds,
yet only one vague word.
And the Eskimos
with twenty-six words for snow,
such a fine alertness
to what variously presses down.
Yesterday I saw lovers
hugging in the street,
making everyone around them
feel lonely, and the lovers themselves -
wasn't a deferred loneliness
waiting for them?
There must be words
for what our aged mothers, removed
in those unchosen homes, keep inside,
and a separate word for us
who've sent them there, a word
for the secret loneliness of salesmen,
for how I feel touching you
when I'm out of touch.
The contorted, pocked, terribly ugly man
shopping in the 24-hour supermarket
at 3 a.m. - a word for him-
and something, please,
for this nameless ache here
in this nameless spot.
If we paid half as much attention
to our lives as Eskimos to snow ...
Still, the little lies,
the never enough.
No doubt there must be Eskimos
in their white sanctums, thinking
just let it fall, accumulate.
-Stephen Dunn
So many different kinds,
yet only one vague word.
And the Eskimos
with twenty-six words for snow,
such a fine alertness
to what variously presses down.
Yesterday I saw lovers
hugging in the street,
making everyone around them
feel lonely, and the lovers themselves -
wasn't a deferred loneliness
waiting for them?
There must be words
for what our aged mothers, removed
in those unchosen homes, keep inside,
and a separate word for us
who've sent them there, a word
for the secret loneliness of salesmen,
for how I feel touching you
when I'm out of touch.
The contorted, pocked, terribly ugly man
shopping in the 24-hour supermarket
at 3 a.m. - a word for him-
and something, please,
for this nameless ache here
in this nameless spot.
If we paid half as much attention
to our lives as Eskimos to snow ...
Still, the little lies,
the never enough.
No doubt there must be Eskimos
in their white sanctums, thinking
just let it fall, accumulate.
-Stephen Dunn
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