The Poetry Org

Oh my pa-pa

Fri, 17 Jun 2011 11:37:00 -0700

Our fathers have formed a poetry workshop.
They sit in a circle of disappointment over our fastballs
and wives. We thought they didn’t read our stuff,
whole anthologies of poems that begin, My father never,
or those that end, and he was silent as a carp,
or those with middles which, if you think
of the right side as a sketch, look like a paunch
of beer and worry, but secretly, with flashlights
in the woods, they’ve read every word and noticed
that our nine happy poems have balloons and sex
and giraffes inside, but not one dad waving hello
from the top of a hill at dusk. Theirs
is the revenge school of poetry, with titles like
“My Yellow Sheet Lad” and “Given Your Mother’s Taste
for Vodka, I’m Pretty Sure You’re Not Mine.”
They’re not trying to make the poems better
so much as sharper or louder, more like a fishhook
or electrocution, as a group
they overcome their individual senilities,
their complete distaste for language, how cloying
it is, how like tears it can be, and remember
every mention of their long hours at the office
or how tired they were when they came home,
when they were dragged through the door
by their shadows. I don’t know why it’s so hard
to write a simple and kind poem to my father, who worked,
not like a dog, dogs sleep most of the day in a ball
of wanting to chase something, but like a man, a man
with seven kids and a house to feed, whose absence
was his presence, his present, the Cheerios,
the PF Flyers, who taught me things about trees,
that they’re the most intricate version of standing up,
who built a grandfather clock with me so I would know
that time is a constructed thing, a passing, ticking fancy.
A bomb. A bomb that’ll go off soon for him, for me,
and I notice in our fathers’ poems a reciprocal dwelling
on absence, that they wonder why we disappeared
as soon as we got our licenses, why we wanted
the rocket cars, as if running away from them
to kiss girls who looked like mirrors of our mothers
wasn’t fast enough, and it turns out they did
start to say something, to form the words hey
or stay, but we’d turned into a door full of sun,
into the burning leave, and were gone
before it came to them that it was all right
to shout, that they should have knocked us down
with a hand on our shoulders, that they too are mystified
by the distance men need in their love.

By Bob Hicok. Published in Poetry, May 2007.

Poet of the Day: Frank Bidart Frank Bidart has a way with...

Mon, 11 Oct 2010 09:40:50 -0700

Poet of the Day: Frank Bidart

Frank Bidart has a way with dramatic monologue poems, unlike any other poet that I’m aware of. In fact, James Franco has made a short film based on his poem, “Herbert White.” Not sure where I can see this piece, but I’d love to, if anyone has suggestions on where to find it.

Two poems I’ve picked for you today are some of Bidart’s quintessential pieces, and though they’re a little long, both are fantastic reads. The first poem is the aforementioned “Herbert White,” about a psychopathic child-killer and necrophiliac. The second poem is called “Ellen West” and is about a woman with anorexia. Both poems are grave insights into human nature. Enjoy.

Robert Bruce: Talking Show #43

Sun, 10 Oct 2010 23:28:25 -0700

Robert Bruce: Talking Show #43:

Quicktime link. One of his most honest podcast episodes yet. Great poem.

Combinatorics

Sat, 09 Oct 2010 21:07:00 -0700

Combinatorics:

bobulate:

The divide between poetry and science isn’t as wide as one might think. In the 1700s certain poems had inherent scientific messages:

[T]he point of poetry was pattern; to use a strict structure of rhythm and rhyme as a framework for words of passion or pedantry that would become fixed in a reader’s brain.

In other words:

Poetry … is mathematics. It is close to a particular branch of the subject known as combinatorics, the study of permutations — of how one can arrange particular groups of objects, numbers or letters according to stated laws. …. As in a great poem, hidden within that elegant structure are deeper truths that touch on apparently unrelated things; on fractal patterns, on the theory of numbers, on primes, and of complexities too deep to be accessible to mere mortals untrained in the mathematical art.

There’s something deeply appealing about these frameworks revealing truths beyond those we can see or feel. I like how Robert Frost put it: “Poetry without rules is like tennis without a net.”

[Image: Best known is “The Loves of the Plants,” by Erasmus Darwin, who in 1791 set out in verse an account of the sexual habits of the vegetable world. He used heroic couplets, in which the rhyme pattern is AA, BB, CC and so on…” [via]

Trying to Get Through

Fri, 08 Oct 2010 09:24:18 -0700

I make a knife of words.
I sit here waiting.
I play with crumbs.

Her eyes that should look
straight at me are
toward the window, glazed—
husband’s horizon?

Not armored. Only armed
with pots and pans.
Not out of arm’s reach,
beyond curtains of doorbells,
garden gates.

She puts up ironwork
in her eyes; it draws a bolt
over what’s real—
then looks at me.

I wish I’d brought my saw.

by Eleanor Ross Taylor

"Poetry is just the evidence of life. If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash."

Fri, 08 Oct 2010 09:14:01 -0700

“Poetry is just the evidence of life. If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash.”

- Attributed to Leonard Cohen.

Popshot Magazine

Fri, 08 Oct 2010 09:06:19 -0700

Popshot Magazine:

Welcome to the future.

Poet of the Day: Mary Oliver I’m not sure why Santa...

Wed, 06 Oct 2010 09:49:13 -0700

Poet of the Day: Mary Oliver

I’m not sure why Santa Barbara bookstores seem to only carry a lot of Mary Oliver and little to none of every other contemporary poet, but it seems that shelves here bear her works with some sort of favoritism. It’s interesting. But then again, Oliver is an interesting poet.

Mary Oliver is a very private poet, still living in Massachusetts after the death of her partner. I’ve always found her poetry to be private as well. Like the stars tell her secrets that they tell no one else.

Two poems I’ve picked for you today are Breakage and Gethsemane (printed below).

Gethsemane by Mary Oliver

The grass never sleeps.
Or the roses.
Nor does the lily have a secret eye that shuts until morning.
Jesus said, wait with me. But the disciples slept.
The cricket has such splendid fringe on its feet,
and it sings, have you noticed, with its whole body,
and heaven knows if it ever sleeps.
Jesus said, wait with me. And maybe the stars did, maybe
the wind wound itself into a silver tree, and didn’t move,
maybe,
the lake far away, where once he walked as on a
blue pavement,
lay still and waited, wild awake.
Oh the dear bodies, slumped and eye-shut, that could not
keep that vigil, how they must have wept,
so utterly human, knowing this too
must be a part of the story.

Poem for Starlings

Tue, 05 Oct 2010 09:38:23 -0700

Poem for Starlings:

By Matthew Rohrer. Great stuff. Hat tip to Matthew Zapruder.

Poet of the Day: Randall Jarrell Randall Jarrell, what a man....

Tue, 28 Sep 2010 09:31:00 -0700

Poet of the Day: Randall Jarrell

Randall Jarrell, what a man. Looks happy here, doesn’t he? His death is still a mystery to most. While being treated for suicide, he went for a walk and was run over by a car. Some believe it was accidental, most people don’t.

Jarrell’s poetry, like Robert Pinsky’s, is one of the few examples I can find of a poet critic who could walk the walk. His poetry is beautiful and heartbreaking and 45 years later, still timeless.

Two poems I have for you today is “The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner” and “90 North” (listed below), where the poet tells us that what often times we think is wisdom, is really just pain.

90 North by Randall Jarrell

At home, in my flannel gown, like a bear to its floe,
I clambered to bed; up the globe’s impossible sides
I sailed all night—till at last, with my black beard,
My furs and my dogs, I stood at the northern pole.

There in the childish night my companions lay frozen,
The stiff furs knocked at my starveling throat,
And I gave my great sigh: the flakes came huddling,
Were they really my end? In the darkness I turned to my rest.

—Here, the flag snaps in the glare and silence
Of the unbroken ice. I stand here,
The dogs bark, my beard is black, and I stare
At the North Pole …
And now what? Why, go back.

Turn as I please, my step is to the south.
The world—my world spins on this final point
Of cold and wretchedness: all lines, all winds
End in this whirlpool I at last discover.

And it is meaningless. In the child’s bed
After the night’s voyage, in that warm world
Where people work and suffer for the end
That crowns the pain—in that Cloud-Cuckoo-Land

I reached my North and it had meaning.
Here at the actual pole of my existence,
Where all that I have done is meaningless,
Where I die or live by accident alone—

Where, living or dying, I am still alone;
Here where North, the night, the berg of death
Crowd me out of the ignorant darkness,
I see at last that all the knowledge

I wrung from the darkness—that the darkness flung me—
Is worthless as ignorance: nothing comes from nothing,
The darkness from the darkness. Pain comes from the darkness
And we call it wisdom. It is pain.

Poet of the Day: Bob Hicok When I first heard of Bob Hicok, he...

Thu, 23 Sep 2010 10:53:00 -0700

Poet of the Day: Bob Hicok

When I first heard of Bob Hicok, he was a poet friend of Marcus Cafagna’s, who was my professor. Since then, Bob is no longer a die cast molder. Bob no longer owns a business. Since then, Bob has published so much that it’s easier naming the journals he hasn’t been in as opposed to the ones he has. Bob has manuscripts of poetry piling up on his desk, literally. This is a guy, it’s rumored, that writes a poem a day. He’s the Rivers Cuomo of the poetry world.

Marcus once got a book that I had of Hicok’s signed. It read, “Zach, you have better things to do than read this book.” My answer is still, “I doubt it.”

Two poems that I’ve picked for you today are “In the loop” and “Her my body.”

For The Unemployed And Underpaid

Thu, 23 Sep 2010 10:29:54 -0700

Wash your face.
Be all the beautiful
you can. Wear lipstick
and fill the cracks left
by former love.
Cover your eyes
in shadow, taint
your brows with color.
For market. For all of us.
We’re all so incandescent
with secrets.
We’re all agleam
with starting over.
Let’s vogue.
We are the surprised.
The divorced.
It was never supposed
to be like this.
Lord God.
We’re all brokenhearted.
We’re all ashamed
and hopeful
that no one notices.
Let’s dance
under the lights.
Let’s eat and drink,
be merry and flirtatious.
Let’s be friends.
Cheers. ¡Salud!
Maybe tomorrow,
we’ll die. Maybe alone.
Maybe I’ve said
these things before.
Maybe it was never
supposed to be like this.
Maybe it was never
our call.

Tony Hoagland reads his poem, “Romantic Moment.”

Wed, 22 Sep 2010 09:57:01 -0700

Tony Hoagland reads his poem, “Romantic Moment.”

To

Tue, 21 Sep 2010 09:47:52 -0700

To:

A great poem by Franz Wright.

Poet of the Day: Reetika Vazirani By almost every account,...

Mon, 20 Sep 2010 09:43:13 -0700

Poet of the Day: Reetika Vazirani

By almost every account, Reetika Vazirani was a poet who was just getting started. I still remember where I was on July 17, 2003, the day after she took the life of her son and then herself. I was working an internship at a concrete company in Springfield, Missouri. I read the news. I believe it was a Thursday. They boy’s father had been Yusef Komunyakaa.

To be honest with you, I had never read her work up to that point. Still haven’t read a lot of it. But I understood the suicide. Back then. I probably still remember the day it all happened because of that reason. I can’t believe it has already been seven years.

Two poems I picked for you today by the late Vazirani are “Two Cities” and “Going to See the Taj Mahal,” both viewable below.

Two Cities by Reetika Vazirani

That 4 a.m. I lay
back on the living room
couch, seeing as it was
still night. At 5 a.m.
Elle’s light in Unit B
upstairs came on, and she
sailed down the wooden steps
and drove off to bake bread
until two. Then I thought
of you doing to me
those things you described on
the phone. I in utter
surprise kept asking, Would
you really? Yes, you would.
But you had not phoned me
this morning, though it flew
anyway: I heard you
patiently interrogate.
At first I didn’t know
what to do.

Six years later
this was better for all
the time taken out, gone
were the unimportant
miles between our cities,
even better than on
the phone or in person,
though it was without doubt
only you in your absence.
Then the sun rose, wiping
away this entanglement,
as I shake creases out
of the sheets and fold them
like a note I will send
to tell you how things are
going, pretty much the
same and good on this end.

Going to See the Taj Mahal by Reetika Vazirani

When we set out on the train to Agra
I thought, What an old palace we are going to see,
it’s an old grave.
I was tired when we reached the station and you hired a taxi
to take us to the steps of the Taj Mahal;
you couldn’t even wait until morning,
said it was something to take in by moonlight,
white marble against black sky is a great sight in moonlight
you said
(marble just cleaned for a holiday).
And there beyond our driver’s wheel I saw the domes—
the large dome and the four surrounding domes.
The silhouette stood out so clearly that for a moment
I forgot this fact in the midst of the splendor
(the long stretch of grass leading up to the site):
the Empress Mumtaz, she bore fourteen heirs for Shah Jahan—
absurd to forget Mumtaz at her marble grave,
marble banded with prophecy and verse.

But what did I know of the Empress except this tomb?
So I pictured her this way:
she was not a beauty, nor especially devout
(always slow to cover her head).
On Thursdays when the open market came past the red
        stone quarry,
she dressed as her handmaid
and took a poor cloth sack into town
where she bartered for beads women wore on ordinary days;
and secretly with cheap dyes she’d paint herself into the wild
        casual beauty of youth
(the kohl inexpertly applied but alluring).
Then she gave her sack away or left it on the road
should someone find it hoarded in her suite—
the Empress buying this five-and-dime garbage!
And she imagined her life without the constant royal curfew.
There were places she couldn’t go—there were even daily
        attractions at the well,
attractions too scandalous to list.

If only the Emperor’s architects knew her!—
to free them from the illusions which inspired the tomb,
to free them from the wished-for glamour of a Mumtaz.

Page Meets Stage Series

Thu, 16 Sep 2010 22:38:51 -0700

Page Meets Stage Series:

Let’s just say that I’ve completely underestimated Taylor Mali. His Page Meets Stage series is fantastic. I’ll be linking to more individual videos in the future. Great stuff.

Speaking of Taylor Mali, his series Page Meets Stage got Yusef...

Thu, 16 Sep 2010 22:23:18 -0700

Speaking of Taylor Mali, his series Page Meets Stage got Yusef Komunyakaa to come out. What a poet.

I normally despise slam poetry on mere principle, and truth be...

Thu, 16 Sep 2010 21:54:00 -0700

I normally despise slam poetry on mere principle, and truth be told, a poem like this would not hold up on paper as well as it does as a performance piece. Poetry and Poetry Slam are not the same, and as long as we realize that the goals of each are different, we can mutually respect each artistic endeavor for the goals they’re trying to achieve.

With that being said, what a performance piece. Introducing Typography by Taylor Mali. Great animation by Ronnie Bruce as well.

Update: My apologies. The poem is actually called Totally like whatever, you know? and can be found here.

Poet of the Day: Matthew Zapruder Matthew Zapruder is a relative...

Wed, 15 Sep 2010 09:15:00 -0700

Poet of the Day: Matthew Zapruder

Matthew Zapruder is a relative newcomer in terms of poets and books published. Come On All You Ghosts is his third collection, published this year. In fact, to be perfectly honest, I just discovered him this morning. But after reading two of his poems at the Poetry Foundation, I was hooked. I went promptly to Amazon and bought his latest collection. I should have it early next week.

Two poems that I’ve picked for you today are the same two that sold me on Zapruder: “Erstwhile Harbinger Auspices” and “The Prelude” where the poet writes, Come to the edge the edge beckoned softly. Take this cup full of darkness and stay as long as you want and maybe a little longer.

Everything Before “Happy” Is True

Tue, 14 Sep 2010 13:48:00 -0700

Mrs. Richey manned the big desk, marking quizzes,
my little desk pulled next to hers like a tender
moored in the lee of a dreadnought holed
below the waterline, while I sidled fearfully through rows
of students crooked by the state over the state’s
disfigured books, laboring toward the past
perfect tense. “Is that past perfect or simply the past?”
I asked again and again until a boy, sick of hearing it,
backhanded me across the neck. I caught my fall
against a thickset girl, who snarled, “Get
your hands off me!”
When I jerked upright,
he was deep in the page before him, beefy fingers
etching piffle—random nouns—into notebook paper.
I bent till we were breathing each other’s breath,
and savored the wincing intimacy as his smirk
withered. I’d been terrified. Now I was rashly happy
as I closed my lips gently over his nose. My future?
Pfft! Even being betrayed as a pervert
meant shit. Holding his shoulder against his rising,
I snapped my canines. He bucked hard once, went limp,
and I spat his blood onto his un-tensed un-sentences.

- by Andrew Hudgins