Clutter, Glorious Clutter

Mind you, I'm not advocating clutter, even though ... looking around as I write this ... I can see that a stranger might think I'm clutter's chief spokesperson.

I try. Oh, how I try not to clutter up the planet in my immediate vicinity.

In my own defense, I must say that I don't toss litter out the car window ... I don't drop candy wrappers on the sidewalk ... in fact, sometimes, when I'm out walking, I pick up the occasional strayed aluminum can and deposit it in the nearest trash container.

But in my immediate vicinity ... here in the study at Brimm Manor ... there's just some invisible force which seems to be at work ... and I am powerless in its grasp.

Things just seem to pile up ... mostly poems in progress ... little notes I've scribbled along the way ... magazines that I really must read (someday) ... little watercolor sketches ... big watercolor sketches ... drawings ... notes to myself. Things like that.

Some days I seem to make progress ... but other days? Well, then it's like trying to sweep the ocean back with a broom.

But I promise you this (and it's not a political promise) ... I'll keep trying. Meanwhile, the poem:

CLUTTER, GLORIOUS CLUTTER

Someday I shall have room

for everything I possess,

all the room I ever dreamed

of having, room to lean back

casually and survey the vast

reaches of things collected

in years of serious pursuit

and delayed disentanglement.

But the jam-packed reality

of today is that I shift

cautiously among the poems

poised for avalanche, books

teeteringon the brink

of revenge for being left

stacked like cold flapjacks

all these busy-busy years,

treasured items gathering

dust, clipped so long ago

from forgotten magazines.

So much of my past, perhaps

my future, too, nudging me

when I turn, bumping me when

I bend, skittering when

we touch, hugging me like

a lover just before the train

pulls out. And I stand here,

loving it all right back.

© 2000

(originally published in Nanny Fanny Poetry Magazine)

***

Today's word: avalanche

Bridge Builder

Sometimes, I think, it's best just to let the poem tell its own story. My comments about a poem's beginning ... the inspiration for it ... my purpose in writing it ... in transforming scribbled notes into the finished product ... all of these, sometimes, are helpful.
Today, though, I think I'll just step back and let the poem do the telling ... all of it:

BRIDGE BUILDER
My grandfather built bridges,

not the bright, towering
monuments to engineering like
those spanning the Mississippi.


His bridges were squat, dark,
wooden things, put up by gangs
of common laborers who spent days,
weeks, sometimes, away from their
families, so trains could go
rolling smoothly across the creeks
and small streams that wrinkled
the face of the earth.


One evening I watched as his
rough, scarred hand gripped a stub
of pencil and the pilings,
cross-members, all the timbers,
ties and rails took shape across
a ruled page of my writing pad.


His eyes glistened when my small
voice asked how far he had traveled
in this work, eating alien food
that strangers plopped on his plate,
trying to sleep in crowded, hot
bunk cars alongside the mainline.


"Too far, and too long," he said,
and I knew the story was over.


That paper is gone, his bridges
replaced by steel structures,
or abandoned as railroads began
surrendering to the superhighways
and airplanes, but how I wish
I had that little drawing, so I
could slide it out, look at it
again, something of him to hold,
now that I’ve come to appreciate
his most important bridge, those
huge hands reaching out to me,
the child nobody wanted, saying,
"Come ... live with me."

© 2006

(Second place winner, Dayton Metro Library 2006 Poetry Contest)

***

Today's word: reaching

Ahead and Behind

I suppose it was there all the time ... an ability, on occasion, to say something that sort of had the sound of poetry ... something that, while alien, perhaps, to the formal, prescribed structure and style of real poetry, had an element that conjured up poetic images for the reader ... or listener.

I began writing these things for myself. They usually came to me during my daily walks. When I got back home, I would sit for a few minutes at the kitchen table, scribbling away.
Then I began sharing these scribblings with Phyllis. She liked them ... at least said she did ... and encouraged me to keep writing.
I did keep writing, and writing, and writing ... and, though today's poem is a bit of an exaggeration ... poetic license, you know ... it does sometimes seem that I've gotten ahead on my writing ... behind on everything else.
Meanwhile, the poem:



AHEAD AND BEHIND

For many years

I wouldn’t venture

into this strange
realm of poetry,
but then, like
a water-loving dog
finding a pond,
I plunged in,

can’t be coaxed

back out, and I’m

paddling around,
getting slowly
ahead on poetry,
way behind on
everything else.

© 2001

(originally published in Capper's)

***

Today's word: paddling

Afterthoughts ... in response to your comments:
Take comfort in knowing that you're not alone in that department, Magran. It seems like only yesterday that I started out feeling full of vim and vinegar, determined to make a lot of headway on the stacks of things waiting patiently for my return ... but it didn't turn out that way ... and I'm afraid to look now ... I know I've fallen farther behind ... on everything, it seems. Among other things, I let myself fall behind on my responses to readers ... and I apologize for that. I know you'll understand ... and I'll be given another chance ... but I apologize. And now ... back to the stacks!

What Was That?

I write a lot about ordinary things ... those things all around me ... things which are seen ... or heard ... almost every day ... things which might go unnoticed, had I not started trying to "see things with new eyes."

Or, I suppose, in this instance, to hear things with new ears.

The poem deals with a bit of ancient history ... so much time has passed since the incident about which I've written ... but it's good to be able to look back, sometimes, to remember ... to chuckle again over something that happened ... something, in the broad sweep of things, quite ordinary ... but still valued.

The poem:

WHAT WAS THAT?

When I heard

a chorus of crickets

in my son's room,

I wasn't surprised.

When I heard bird calls,

that didn't faze me

in the least.

But when I heard

the songs of whales,

I sat upright

and took notice.

Just a CD, Dad,

he reassured me,

and I drifted off

with hardly a ripple.

© 1995

(originally published in The Christian Science Monitor)

***

Today's word: ripple

Afterthoughts ... in response to your comments:

Thank you, Magran. I agree, it is comforting to remember. I do find comfort in so many of the memories I've stored up over the years.

Such Silent Grace

I was only a block away from home, fighting the wind all the way from the bus stop, when this flight of birds caught my eye. They moved so easily, so gracefully, "as one fluid body" ... a kind of movement that has always intrigued me ... while I remained rooted on the sidewalk, struggling.
They were quite like a school of minnows, quickly changing course, darting this way and that.
Perhaps there was some urgency in their movement ... they may have been seeking shelter from the coming storm ... or they may simply have been exulting in their ability to fly ... and not just to fly, but to fly in such a masterfully coordinated way.
Oh, couldn't we take some lessons from them as we go through life, bumping and jostling each other?
This one received an honorable mention in a Poets' Study Club competition; it was also included in my first collection, Chance of Rain, published in 2003 by Finishing Line Press:


SUCH SILENT GRACE

A flight of birds
passes like a whisper,
soaring and swooping
as one fluid body,
moving swiftly under
darkening clouds.

Rain-bearing winds
swirl as if echoing
such silent grace,
rocking small trees,
making street signs
dance and chatter,
sending pedestrians
scurrying, holding
onto their hats
as they go leaning
toward home.

Still, these tiny
birds remain aloft,
their movements like
a school of minnows,
rippling, darting,
in their element.

© 2003


(By the way, some time during the night Chosen Words received Visitor No. 34,000. Thank you for creating that milestone by stopping by. I hope you enjoyed what you found here, and will find time for another visit ... soon.)


                         ***

Today's word: exulting

My Three Loves

I think a love poem might be in order today ... at least to get our minds off the winter weather for a little while.
This one is mainly about my eighth-grade teacher, who stirred an abiding interest in reading in me, but it's also about the librarian I met at another time, in another town, as a result of my interest in reading.

That librarian and I are still sharing a mutual interest in reading, and she is the one who listens patiently to the things I've written.
But, getting back to the main thread of the poem: I was so glad when I was able to visit my former teacher, Miss Pearl, a few years ago, to thank her for imparting her love for reading ... and to introduce her to that librarian, my wife, Phyllis.
The poem:


MY THREE LOVES
Could Miss Pearl have known
that her own love of reading
would so transform the life

of a hungering eighth grader
whom her gentle, healing voice
touched with daily readings?

Fragile fingers softly turning
the pages of her beloved books,
she made visions of mere words,

openings to worlds where people
could dream, hope, and achieve.
These, she told us, were worlds

where we, too, might go, in fact,
belonged. Did she know, or did she
merely dream the teacher's dream

that the tiny seeds might endure,
take root, flower? Did she know
that her devoted love of reading

would become my own, eventually
leading me to that certain library
where I would find you? How else

could she have sustained herself
through those despairing years?
Questions still seek answers,

but of this I'm sure: Her gift,
so freely given, became more dear
than I, or even she, ever dreamed.

© 2001


(originally published in Capper's)

***

Today's word: sustained

Afterthoughts ... in response to your comments:
You're right, Southernmush ... I certainly do owe much ... so much ... to Miss Pearl for fanning the spark of interest I had in reading ... that has stayed with me ... and helped to carry me through some difficult chapters along the way. And now I'm savoring the results of that ... sharing my poetry with those who pause to listen. That is really the icing on the cake.
Thank you, Vicki, for that comment. I was headed toward teaching, too ... or so I thought. There were a few obstacles in the way, though, and I ended up doing other things, instead ... but there were always helping hands, too ... people who showed me the way ... patient people who helped me along. I owe them all a huge debt of gratitude ... and my poetry, I suppose, is one way of paying back part of that debt.   

Ice-Cold Memories

We're "enjoying" single-digit temperatures in this part of Ohio this morning ... but it has stopped snowing ... I think. I'm almost afraid to look out.

When I was a youngster, winter was probably my favorite season. Oh, I could've done without the tingling toes, the fingers sticking to cold metal ... the nose that froze ... but I loved the snow. It was like having a featherbed ... albeit a very cold one ... to romp on.

But that changed.

I suppose age has something to do with it, and I don't know if the weather is becoming more extreme ... or if I am becoming more sensitive to changes ... or it's all just my imagination.

I'm sure of one thing, though, a search of my extensive records would show that today's poem was written in the middle of one of those sizzling summer months when the pavement starts turning to goo and thoughts turn to the prospect of frying an egg on the sidewalk.

And I know this, too, I was looking for ways of surviving.

Ice-cold memories, pressed to the sizzling brow, may not be the answer, but I think they help. Right now, with the cold chasing me indoors after about ten minutes of shoveling, I'm storing up a lot of those memories.

I think I may already have more than enough to help pull me through whatever next summer's heat can bring.

The poem:

ICE-COLD MEMORIES

In the root cellar

of my mind

I have memories

of last winter

lying on the shelves

to help me survive

these front-burner

days of summer.

I shall pull them out

one by one, to press

to my sizzling brow,

daily hoping that

I have stored enough

to carry me through

until autumn

comes galloping up.

© 1995

(originally published in Capper's)

***

Today's word: sizzling

Afterthoughts ... in response to your comments:

Oh, Southernmush ... I know what you mean about the layers and layers of clothing ... if I were to fall down outdoors, I think I would just roll around and around, until somebody came along to help me back on my feet. But remember ... as Professor Squigglee would say ... we're another day closer to spring. It's not just around the corner, yet, but it's out there ... someplace.