Here are some pix taken this A.M. at Zuccotti Park. It’s become a bit of a tent city, NYPD overlooking, bemused? Resigned? Also kind of cold and tired?
Posted tagged ‘manicddaily’
FYI Occupy Wall Street- Zuccotti Park- Pix of November 7, 2011
November 7, 2011Blog Apology – Prompts/Circumstances/November
November 7, 2011
Magpie Tale (Pantoum)
November 6, 2011
The drawing above is based on the prompt of Tess Kincaid at Magpie Tales, which was a photograph from a cemetery. The photograph offered a lot of possibilities; my poem is a pantoum about a funeral, the differing feelings (from numbness to grief) that go through one’s brain at such an event.
What Funerals Are For
I worried that I might not be able to stop
the posturing that shaped my busy mind—
all I’d see, all whom I might know,
imagined encounters over funeral supper wine.
The posturing, the shape of busy mind,
dwarfed the Jesus-coated windows, babes in stone,
(imagined encounters over Last Supper wine)
when fingers touching lid, they led it down.
Dwarfing the Jesus-coated windows, babes in stone,
a block of wood, of over-polished grain,
as fingers touching lid, they led it down,
pulling with it, a winding sheet of weighty pain.
A block of wood, of over-polished grain—
I knew she couldn’t breathe there, that she’d no more breath
pulling within a winding sheet of weighty pain,
weeping without will, without relief.
I knew she couldn’t breathe there, that she’d no more breath,
and all I saw, all whom I might know,
weeping without will, without relief.
I worried that I might not be able to stop.
Poetics – Color Poem (Or Monochromatic One) Maybe
November 5, 2011
I am still supposedly working on Nanowrimo, but I wrote a poem in my head yesterday, and it happens to fit in (sort of) with dVerse Poets Pub Poetics prompt of the day (hosted by Victoria of liv2write2day.blogspot), which is to write a poem using color.
Date
“It’s hurting me”, she whispered,
“I want it to hurt,” he said.
Later, she lay on a bathroom floor,
its hard checkered tiles,
the only black and white
In the whole situation.
After posting the above poem, I thought of a different variation that I like better I think as it has more of a moral compass. Here it is.
Date
“It’s hurting me”, she whispered,
“I want it to hurt,” he said.
Later, she lay on a bathroom floor,
its hard checkered tiles,
the only black and white
in the entire world.
Any suggestions welcomed!
Friday Flash 55 – 99 Percent at Downtown NYC Subway Station
November 4, 2011
Varying Percentages At Fulton Street Station
Yesterday, cop at the subway by Occupy Wall Street dressed as a hippie. Today, the guy wears plain clothes; i.e. his uniform.
He got two occupiers though, fare-skippers, thoughtful faces hangdog now, betrayed; victory in his stance, scribbling–as he mumbles ‘sorry’–tickets.
Just behind, tourist wedges around the turnstile, card outspent, confused, unseen.
I am telling this 55 word story (minus) title to the G-Man, also to Occupy Wall Streeters who get on the train at the Fulton Street Station, usually with metro cards, but sometimes perhaps without. The station looks abandoned at the bottom entrance; it isn’t.
Man’yoshu Poetry? (What’s that?) With Ladybug
November 3, 2011
I swore to myself (and this blog) that I would devote at least some of this month to a modified Nanowrimo of revising old manuscripts. But… it’s really hard to get the steam up for a long project mid-work-week. So, instead, here is my contribution to dVerse Poets “Form For All” Night, which today focuses on Man’yoshu poetry, a form of Japanese Poetry that includes variations dedicated to love/longing. There is a wonderful exposition of this particular tradition written by “Lady Nyo” a/k/a Jane Kohut-Bartels, that can be found here.
I’m afraid my picture turned out better than my poem, but here’s my own rough attempt:
Ladybug On Navy Shawl
A ladybug, deep
orange, lands on the navy
of my paisleyed shawl;
mountains uplift the view but,
because I cannot
see through eyes that turn green when
faced with color, I
mean, your eyes, all here pales, and
my mind looks past the
now to times when you watched it
with me, when the here,
because you were there, held such
wonders always, your quick breaths.
Feeling very human in Downtown NYC
November 2, 2011I’m trying trying trying to work on Nanowrimo, but instead I wrote a new, kind of random piece, for a site hosting an event called Imperfect Prose. This prose poem is very imperfect, but came to me walking home through downtown NYC.
Feeling Human in Downtown NYC
I am thinking, as I walk past Ground Zero–I am not thinking, as I walk,
of Ground Zero, but I am thinking as I walk past, the tall wire fence
on one side, the red neon storefront on the other, of what keeps us human–what
capacities–and my mind, not thinking in the least bit about Ground Zero until
now when I see myself in my mind’s eye
walking there, the sidewalk dark as a night that is not blue
as this night is, this night sheeting Church Street, the lights of the scaffolding–
I am thinking that it has to do with pain–first, the inability to remember
pain. By this, I mean to recreate pain, to physically call it back,
to make one’s self feel again a pain
not currently manifest–
And I think, as I walk past Ground Zero,
of the birth of my second child, of the tan scuffed front seat
beneath my grip–I was sitting in back–of a car service station wagon
somehow so different from the midnight-colored seat of the car service sedan
that took me to the birth of my first child, and yet in those moments
that followed each contraction, like the very same ride.
I know this pain, I kept thinking, intimately, astonished with each wrench
that the memory had not imprinted itself like
a difficult scar, to be felt whenever touched, to be felt
when even approached,
and yet, even now, even as I remember so exactly the white slant lines on that
tan seatback that looked as if someone had run a dull knife across it,
I cannot come up with the pain, but only my reactions to it,
the way my upper torso tried to arch from the lower,
the way my mind
scrambled like junked marbles,
the disbelief that pain like that
could ever be part of the natural order of things, the
terror that surrender
might just be meaningless.
And then I think, as I get to a corner–there are stairs on one side
leading up to Brooks Brothers, and on the other Liberty Street
where the old Deutsch Bank building stood, killing two more firemen in its
dismemberment–but I don’t think of them, the weight of machinery smashing
through broken, mismanaged, floors, nor even do I think of how, just across the way,
shadows may still hover, escaping flame–
I think of the ability to imagine pain–how this same body
that cannot recreate its own torment–how it will, if
fully human, cringe or stream with tears
at the sight of a blow, at the muted thud of kick, the
torn cry, the fall, the hew, bang, loss–there
was a man flat on the floor of Grand Central yesterday, feet too neatly
askew, with blood blooming on his forehead like a flag, the soldiers–we have
those now–and police stilled beside him in a watchful pentagon.
I had to be careful then at West Street, as I walked and thought, because it’s hard
in this part of the City, the scale aggrandized, not to be hit by
a car,
how the inability to remember pain allows us to
go on, while the second–the ability to imagine pain–makes us to stop–
(or stop that which should be stopped)
only I think now, as I write this, of all those spirits in the air, and
the blossom of the fire balls, the reeling cry of the street, the blurs of smoke
and dust and all those wisps of photos (the
missing, not to be found)
and my heart finds suddenly that it does remember pain,
and that it can feel that remembered pain,
again and again and again,
even though I cannot think of anything I personally
truly
lost upon that day, anything that I could call
my own.
Over Herd on the Hudson Line
November 2, 2011
Amazing sights outside the train window. Sorry for the blurs–train moving, me half asleep.
Nanowrimo Begins – No More Excuses! I mean, Yes, An Excuse!
November 1, 2011
Lappup?
Today is November 1, the beginning of National Novel Writing Month, a/k/a Nanowrimo.
Nanowrimo is a very fun program for people who want to kickstart their writing. It provides three very important elements for the struggling writer: a deadline, a community, and, most importantly perhaps, an excuse.
By “excuse”, I mean a reason to give novel writing priority, as in “oh I’m so sorry, I can’t possibly cook the turkey–I have to finish my nanowrimo!”
I have participated in Nanowrimo a few times. (Luckily, my daughters are great cooks.) And actually, amazingly, I am about to publish a book that was first written in a month of November. It is called Nose Dive, and like Nanowrimo itself, it’s a lot of fun. (More on this as the book comes out!)
However, I have also accumulated a number of unfinished manuscripts.
This Nanowrimo month, I am hoping to finish at least one of those.
In order to do this extensive rewriting–which is frankly kind of painful–I really have to force myself to focus, which should mean cutting down on the blogging. (A relief no doubt to subscribers.) I’ll probably still post some short things for the communal sites, like dVerse Poets Pub. (You see, I’m already waffling.) But I really am going to try to force myself to focus on my bigger projects.
Thanks for any good wishes coming my way! And thanks so much for past support.
PS – if you are from dVerse Poets Pub, the link I posted for Open Link night can be found here.
Scary Thought, Scary Number (7,000,000)
October 31, 2011
This Halloween (that is, today, October 31, 2011) is the estimated birthday, according to the U.N.‘s Population Fund, of the world’s 7 billionth person.
I love babies, and a lot of the news stories on this subject has shown some very cute ones (as well as some slightly less cute red squiggly ones.) Even so, the number is kind of frightening. It is a number that is significantly more than twice the world population in the year of my birth. (And, though I often feel antediluvian, I’m not truly.)
There are some (particular those who oppose birth control) who feel that those who are concerned about these escalating numbers are selfish, anti-human, anti-life.
In my view, the opposite is true. Yes, I admit that I do like the notion of a world that still contains empty spaces, that still allows people the possibility of moments of solitude, that does not use all its resources in energy and food production, that is not cut up into little tiny squares.
But I am also worried (as I think many are) that if humans don’t try to exert some kindly control over population, natural forces will exert more drastic controls–famine, disaster, war, disease.
It’s all just kind of scary.
ManicDDaily 
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