Archive for April 2010
April 20, 2010
Glue
Twentieth day of National Poetry Month. I keep expecting this experiment (writing a draft poem a day in honor of National Poetry Month) to get easier–for topics to appear at my beck and call. But it was a bit hard to come up with a draft poem today. All I could think of on the subway this morning was “rhinovirus”. (I have a cold.) That topic was not all that appealing. So, this evening, I fell back on my old standby form–the sonnet, and an old standby subject—relationships.
Couple
Sometimes it’s best to just do nothing,
to stare blankly at a wall and not to
wonder how the crack was made, to toughen
your perimeter nerves till you’ve got to
feel more than a jab of despair to fête
despairing. Sometimes it’s best not to run
your finger down the plaster, but to let
crumbling crumble; not to reach out one
overheated foot from the blanket, bed,
to climb the chill of that almost smooth plane.
Sometimes it’s even best to leave unsaid
words that will fix everything, that saying
that’s aphoristic but so true, the glue
you’d like to think would make all whole, all new.
For more on sonnets, and more on National Poetry Month, check out the poetry category from the ManicDDaily home page. And, as always, check out the link to 1 Mississippi on Amazon, a counting book for kids, parents and their pachyderms.
Categories: poetry, writing exercises
Tags: 20th day of National Poetry Month, manicddaily, ManicDDaily poem, ManicDDaily poetry, National Poetry Month, sonnet, sonnet about couples (fighting)
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April 19, 2010
Shoe
I got my shoes shined today for a special evening event (which delayed my posting till now). I don’t get my shoes shined very often, so it provided useful material for today’s poem draft (as well as a beautiful dark sheen.)
Shoeshine
He stiffens his finger with
a wrapped flap of plastic then, with the precision of
a surgeon, binds it with a worn swathe of
fabric. In a world in which all is disposable, his cloth
is ragged, frayed, stained, authentically used.
Like so, like so—he sprinkles a dose of something clear, then,
after rubbing my dark
rounded toes, delves his finger into the thin can which holds
the black, more tar than jet,
the color of spider bellies, widows’ skirts,
that shadow in the cheek of certain saints outlined by
El Greco, the eyebrow of Frieda Kahlo.
He is short, as they tend to be, born in mountains,
where height adds insult to
uphill climbs, a slight tilt a part of the landscape.
He strokes the sides of my shoes
as he paints them; I feel the strokes
in the sides of my feet,
the ribs of the arches, like a very
polite massage, the caress of the humble, and think of the feet
of certain statues, whose insteps have been worn
into silent tongues by those
seeking blessings, though I
feel blessed by him, his attentions, the worn, made new.
It is something of which we don’t speak.
Categories: poetry, Uncategorized, writing exercises
Tags: 19th Day of National Poetry Month, manicddaily, Manicddaily pencil drawing, ManicDDaily poetry, National Poetry Month, poem about shoeshines, shoes
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April 18, 2010
Iron Pan
18 days of draft poems!
I have to confess that it was hard today to come up with something to write about. My mind felt blank; anything I did come up with seemed too personal for a blog post. (It’s one thing to be personal in a finished poem; another to be overly personal in a draft.) Finally, I bugged my husband for a topic; in the middle of cooking, he came up with “iron frying pan.” Although this seemed a promising starting point, my blank mind had a hard time fitting words around it until I decided to try my own advice from prior posts, and turn to a traditional poetic form, a sonnet.
The sonnet is one of my favorite forms: the interlocking lines lead you through the poem, which, because it is only fourteen lines, thankfully, can’t, go on too long. I heartily recommend trying one!
A couple of hints: it is useful to number your lines (in the margins) after you get to the 8th or 9th, as it is amazingly easy to lose track of where you are. Also, I find it easier to write sonnets in a notebook by hand, than on the computer. Nearly every time I begin to run out of steam, I re-copy what I’ve done up to that point; sometimes tearing out my prior page so I can see it better. The re-copying allows me to refresh my momentum, and also to clarify where the poem is going, or stuck. Weirdly enough, it seems easier to cut out whole lines and phrases when you are writing by hand and re-copying than when you are on the computer. It is much easier to give undeserved authority to words in typeface than to barely legible scribbles.
Anyway, here’s the draft of the day:
Second Marriage
He’s the kind of guy who carefully seasons
an iron skillet, oiling the surface,
eschewing soap. I know all the reasons,
understand rust, stickiness, nonetheless,
I squeeze Dawn right onto the blackness,
and when I smell that low-heated oil, I
rebel. “Are you,” I charge (nearly senseless),
“seasoning my frying pan?” As if to try
traditional method, some slow process
of caretaking, is intended to defy,
deny, descry, the rushed independence
I’ve professed, those hurry-up lone years I
scraped so many sharp implements across,
getting rid of the hard bits, loss and loss.
Categories: poetry, writing exercises
Tags: 18th day of National Poetry Month, benefits of sonnets, iron frying pan sonnet, manicddaily, ManicDDaily poem, ManicDDaily poetry, ManicDDaily watercolor, National Poetry Month, Second Marriage sonnet, sonnet, watercolor of iron frying pan, writing about sonnets
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April 17, 2010
On Plane (Forgot the Socks.)
A lot of traveling today and now I’m staying in a moldy, motel room. Agh. Sometimes when you are having trouble with inspiration, it’s best to turn to a traditional form like a sonnet. The form itself can help move you through the poem, getting you to something like completion. For more on the sonnet form, look in the poetry category from the ManicDDaily home page.
Flying
To be made love to in your head at thirty
thousand feet is a good way to relax,
at thirty thousand feet. Not truly flirty
or even dirty-minded; no attacks
on those around you, whose hands or chests or chins,
today, tend towards the pudgy in any case,
and, besides, are so pre-occupied with “in
flight entertainment” as to fully erase
your presence, as well as the close-up sky,
that dip of cloud and blue you’ve always loved, even so,
you don’t look either, but drift, as you fly,
through sinews, murmurs, even the after-glow
of a warmth that’s kindled only in your brain
(though you always wear wool socks upon a plane.)
Categories: poetry, writing exercises
Tags: 17th Day of National Poetry Month, elephant on plane, manicddaily, Manicddaily pencil drawing, ManicDDaily poetry, National Poetry Month, sonnet, sonnet re fantasies on air plane, sonnet re sexual fantasies
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April 16, 2010
New Yorker In a Car (Outside of New York)
Unfortunately, this 16th day of National Poetry Month was so busy I had little time to focus on much poetic. A good day, in short, for draft limericks!
I’m sorry to say that the limericks I did (which connect as one longer poem draft) have a fairly limited subject matter; they describe that feeling of “going to seed” which may descend on vacation, particularly a family vacation, in which normal exercise and eating routines are put to the side; this feeling may be particularly pronounced in the case of the peripatetic New Yorker.
The limerick form is five lines, with a rhyme scheme that is typically: A, A, b, b, A; with the first, second and fifth rhyming lines longer than the truncated couplet of the third and fourth lines.
Traveling New Yorker
There was an old gal from New York
who watched what she put on her fork;
still, outside the confines
of the Four and Five lines,
she felt herself turning to pork.
The thing is that life in the City
made her walk through the nit and the gritty,
while, whenever afar,
she traveled by car,
quite bad for the hips, more’s the pity.
So she worried, this gal from Manhattan,
as she felt herself fatten and fatten–
too many fast treats–
too many cheap eats–
and just about all came au gratin.
Oh, for her home—twenty blocks to a mile;
twenty steps too, till the average turnstile.
Sure, there was soot,
but she’d breathe it on foot.
Once back, she’d stay put for a while.
Categories: elephants, New York City, poetry, Uncategorized, writing exercises
Tags: Elephant drawing, elephant driving car, explanation of limerick form, getting fat limericks, limerick form, manicddaily, ManicDdaily drawing, ManicDDaily poetry, National Poetry Month, New York City, New York City subway, New York limerick, poetry, Poetry exercise, traveling New Yorker limerick, writing exercise
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April 15, 2010
Ah, Blue!
It’s the 15th day of National Poetry Month and also you know what. I started to write my daily draft poem about an idle tax day comment overheard at a Florida Starbucks, but then ended up working on a completely different draft poem, something a little closer to home.
Communion
What a gift it is to sit
with someone you love and not hear
about the body/blood, given/shed,
for your or anyone’s salvation,
redemption,
success/despair,
education, regeneration
in remembrance of.
What sweetness not to discuss
any house in any location,
great aunt or uncle,
small town or large,
teacher or outfit (with
or without peter pan collar,
ruffed cuff),
income or IQ;
patience so much more elusive than gratitude,
love task-like in its minutiae,
the sullenness of childhood a sharp stone
on memory lane.
Ah, the communion of the trivial shared right now,
the small square tile that bears a silent “e”,
the ace on the card table,
the deliciousness of breeze or scone.
I sit with my parents and paint.
Those who do not paint often
focus intently on
a carefully drawn petal or jagged blotch of sea.
Ah, blue; ah, green; ah, yellow.
Categories: parenting, poetry, writing exercises
Tags: 15th Day of National Poetry Month, Family communion poem, hanging out with parents poem, manicddaily, ManicDDaily poetry, ManicDDaily watercolor, National Poetry Month, painting poem, poetry, Poetry exercise, writing exercise
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April 14, 2010
Blank Page and Sock
The 14th day of National Poetry Month, sigh. The draft sonnet I wrote today is intended to illustrate the principle that a poem can be written with no inspiration whatsoever! In other words, don’t wait for the muse.
The draft below follows the rhyme scheme of a Shakespearean sonnet; although I do keep to certain syllabic limits (approximately 10 or 11 syllables per line), I’m not sure that these exactly correspond to iambic pentameter. For more on sonnet structures, check here, (or check out the poetry category form the home page of this blog). For more on writer’s block, check out the writer’s block category.
Writer’s Block Sonnet
A blank page is not like a plain white sock.
It will do nothing for a cold foot at night,
and fits poorly into a shoe; you can’t tuck
your pants into it as part of a fight
against Lyme’s Disease; it won’t put you at ease
in any way; won’t cushion the impact
of concrete; won’t even give you release
from the itch of sand or pine needle, the tact
of the blank page so much less than the sock,
though also white and cheap and omnipresent.
The page won’t be worn quietly, it will talk
to you, it will talk at you; it will resent
any effort to shush its voice, cap its sound.
You won’t listen? Then, it will stare you down.
Categories: poetry, Uncategorized, writer's block, writing exercises
Tags: 14th day of National Poetry Month, don't wait for the muse, manicddaily, ManicDDaily poetry, ManicDDaily watercolor, silly sonnet, sonnet about blank page, watercolor of blank page and sock, writer's block sonnet, writing exercise
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April 13, 2010
Hot Room in Air-Conditioned House
It’s the thirteenth day of National Poetry Month and I got up at 3:45 a.m. for a flight down to Florida. As a result, I’ve focused on short poems, haiku, for my drafts of the day. (For those of you who have not been following this blog, I am honoring National Poetry Month by writing a draft poem a day.)
A classic haiku is seventeen syllables – five in the first line; seven in the second line, and five again in the third line. Some people (who put content ahead of form) do not abide by these syllabic rules. Given that a haiku is traditionally written in Japanese, this could probably be justified. However, because I tend towards the formal more than the meaningful, I try to keep my haiku to the seventeen syllable format. (Note– title doesn’t count, so it’s a good way to slip in a few more syllables.)
So here are a few haiku, written both in New York, pre-dawn trip to Florida, and after. Please remember they are all drafts, and are intended to inspire you to your own efforts (which are bound to be as good.)
Killer Frost (in Fortune Cookie Style)
Premature blossoms
bear no fruit. Let buds knot wood
till truly their time.
Lack of Sleep As A Cure for Depression
I’m finding, of late,
the ebullience of no sleep.
Regret fades at two.
Florida
Porched concrete like the
forced march of Bermuda grass
fends off ant and file.
Symmetric
Two coconuts hang
like velour dice from a frond.
Is this all just luck?
Airless Room
The hot room in an
air-conditioned house: vacuum-
sealed, energy-proof.
Nap
Middle of the day
sleep, warm breath thick and soft as
flesh; some manage it.
Pre-blossom Branch
Categories: elephants, poetry, writing exercises
Tags: 13th Day of National Poetry Month, ant and file, Florida Haiku, haiku, haiku form explanation, haiku re sleeplessness as cure for depression, Haiku re warm nap, manicddaily, ManicDDaily haiku, Manicddaily pencil drawing, ManicDDaily poetry, ManicDDaily watercolor, National Poetry Month, pencil drawing of resting elephant, poetry exercises, watercolor of spring branch
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April 12, 2010
Grrr....
I guess I’ve not been in the best mood lately. This 12th poem draft seems to be evidence of that. (Lesson of the day–writing can be a way to vent your feelings!)
Cheater
When someone cheats me, or worse,
cheats my friend, one for whom
I’ve stood in, stood up, I understand the mind
of the stalker.
I want to call the cheater, anonymously, at
whatever time he grins, and hiss
imprecations of punishment,
both divine and karmic. I want
to seek out his car and smear something
on the glass that will dry hard and
impenetrable—tomato paste,
shellac, maybe sardines–
spelling out some simple
characterization like “this guy
is a big fat cheat,” or
“smells like dead fish.”
I want to picture him
rattled, spilling large mugs of coffee
over a beige shag rug.
(A part of me wants to imagine him
stumbling with borscht, only anti-oxident,
wonderful beets are
just too good for the likes of him.)
Speaking of beets, I’d like to beat him, only not
in the flesh, but in the mind, in a re-make of
that money game we’ve just concluded (or he and
my “friend”), only this time I’d bargain him down
to a pinhead, a place from which he would truly beg, at which point,
I would gladly extend largess; I’d be absolutely
generous, a softie all over again, happy
to show him, at last, how these things should be done.
Categories: poetry, Uncategorized, writing exercises
Tags: angry poem, borscht poem, manicddaily, Manicddaily pencil drawing, ManicDDaily poem, poem about cheaters, poem about sardines on car, poem about stalking, poetry, writing exercise
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April 11, 2010
Mermaid
A dear friend suggested the topic of mermaids for a poem. At first, I envisaged a poem about teenage girls diving into the surf on a tropical beach; but the poem that came out, a sonnet, was somewhat different. I send an apology in advance to my more mature (in spirit) readers who thought I was finally over my Robert Pattinson fixation.
Different Tastes in Mythical Creatures
Some go for vampires; they like the idea
of sharp but elegant pursuit, the notion
that they personally are the cup of tea
of the ruthless. Others look to the oceans,
scanning fantastic waves for a gleam of gleam,
twist of twist, the well-hipped curve of tail;
their magic’s found in the muscular seam
between breast and flipper, flesh and scale.
They love the submergence, dive to the unknown,
an elegance unclothed in its own wet skin,
Eve and the serpent combined, slicked hair let down,
the search for safety in the dare, plunge, swim.
Others—we’re too afraid to go in headfirst,
would rather wait, dryly, to slake another’s thirst.
For more on the mechanics on sonnets, check here.
Categories: poetry, writing exercises
Tags: 11th day of National Poetry Month, manicddaily, ManicDDaily poem, ManicDDaily watercolor, mermaid and vampire poem, Mermaid and vampire sonnet, mermaid poem, National Poetry Month, Robert Pattinson, sonnet, watercolor of mermaid
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