ManicDDaily

Who Would Be Thin

As those following this blog know, I am honoring National Poetry Month by writing (sort of) a draft poem a day.   The aim is not only to get myself to write some poems, but to get you writing them too.

In that spirit, it may be useful to discuss some of what gives rise to each draft.  Yesterday’s “Good News/Bad News” actually came from the suggested topic of “killer frost”,  which is what the Hudson Valley appeared to be facing last night due to the sudden drop in temperature after an  incredibly warm week.   I ended up finding “killer frost” a bit too depressing to write about, but it did set in motion the idea of “good news/bad news.”

I’m not quite sure of what the “inspiration” for today’s draft is;  maybe it came out of a sense of deprivation this morning that it was Saturday,  I was on my own, sore-eyed, with a great many chores to do;  this somehow brought up the idea of  thinness , though the poem went in a somewhat different direction.  Please keep in mind–it’s a draft!  Any suggestions for this one, or any of them, are greatly appreciated.

Those Who Would Be Thin

There are those who want to be thin.
We’ve seen their breath-filled
cheeks jog along a walk, their knees a seeming
abundance in straight legs, their forearms softly downed
like some human thistle.
Magician and assistant alike, they saw
their bodies in half, seem to make vanish
tidbits with sleight of mouth
or wrist or palm, seem to.
Magician and dove at once, they crave
a flight that will lift them from the thick wooden
planks of the daily, the deep velvet droop of curtain
to their sides, the darkly spot lit stage,
into a blue-veined streak of sky,
the haven of the spare, where they can be
both coveted and bypass notice at once,
translucence made flesh, opalescence made bone,
where light alone is swallowed
like a sword.