ALL RESPONSES |
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Reason to write,
to breathe, to move:
Sensitive glass
burns inside. Relies on
wanderings so crass -
visions of flash bulbs,
crank turns memories -
a windmill, a watermill
spills spent songs
along craggy rock bottoms,
spin and crack.
Cagey, borrowed words
stop along the path.
Bend over, stoop,
collapse into shadow
pop daisy stems
with thumbnails
stand up straight
look skyward
for words. |
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I learn the most about you
by what you speak behind:
a strange language on four
legs, crawling back and forth
over my skin; verbal book
marks of those cities
you visited before I was
born...the ones you always
meant to return to and do
so now in that funny way
you speak with dementia.
Last week you asked me
if your mother was still alive,
this two weeks before
your seventy-ninth birthday;
At that moment my heart
was a collection of birds
without sounds and I thought
forgive me, father, I want
to remove your name,
I want to see you bare. |
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I’d like to thank all members of Northography for the work they put into this project. What began as an experiment became a solid platform for fostering creativity and enabling communication between artists. Many of you have published the results of your efforts elsewhere. Some of us may even have noticed an improvement (or an evolution) in our writing in the course of participating. Others took advantage of the opportunity to read their work in public in diverse venues. And of course, acquaintances and even friendships were formed. Looking back, I think we can all say it was very successful for all involved.
From my perspective, Northography surpassed all of my expectations, leading me into realms of human experience I never knew existed. Four years ago, my original intent was to learn as much as possible about the art of writing. Going back to school was not an option (it still isn’t), and there were talented writers in the Twin Cities who were willing to exchange ideas with me in person. The 180 mile round trip, however, proved to be a deterrent to regular visits. Web technology presented itself as a viable option for bringing together creative writers located in the Twin Cities and greater Minnesota, and the project was born.
Our first members readily embraced the concept of an online literary community. They posted poems and compared notes. Requests were made for enhancements and corrections, and the desire for promotions came to the forefront. I never had the objective of using Northography to promote myself, and still don’t, but I understand why it is necessary for those who have worked hard to publish a book. Which, incidentally, is something I still haven’t done. Maybe now, after three years of receiving assistance from our very gracious and talented members, I’m a few steps closer to producing work worthy of publication. No one said it would be easy, and it isn’t.
I feel, though, that the lively workshop environment was valuable for me and others. From the beginning, I felt that I could not expect members to write unless I posted work regularly. For this reason, I posted some sort of creative writing at least once a week for the last three years. Some of it was pretty good. Some of it was forced, carelessly written or just plain bad. It was essential to overcome any fear of making mistakes or of writing bad poetry. After all, the purpose of the website was not final publication, but education and experimentation. I thank all of you who pointed out my mistakes, my failed attempts and my omissions. They weren’t my first, and won’t be my last.
Something like Northography will return when my professional life stabilizes. It may have a different name and look. It will probably allow authors to edit their own material online. I hope that when it does return, all of you will still be willing to utilize it to enhance your creativity. Until then, don’t be a stranger – send me an email or give me a call. And keep on writing. |
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I've gone through a few writing phases in my fifty-two (soon) years. I wrote voraciously in college. Mostly crap but I wrote. I quit for almost twelve years. Never wrote anything. Something tripped when my mother died and I met some folks in Austin that spurred me to write a bit. Not much, but I wrote. I hit my playwright phase in 2001. On a bet I wrote a short play and it was performed in Rochester. I couldn't believe it.
And then later, you sent me an e-mail about northography. It sounded fun so I took a look. I sent my first poem on June 26, 2006. There have been 138 stimuli since. I have responded 311 times. Most of my stuff is crap but every once-in-a-while, something worthwhile comes out and I feel real good about it. I thank you for that feeling. northography has sharpened my senses. northography has made me aware of my surroundings, made think really hard about my memories and my relationships, especially with my dad. northography has made me focus on my plays. Three of my plays have been as a direct result of the stimuli posted. My writing will always be a work in progress, but northography has given me a sense of direction...and more importantly a shot of confidence that maybe...just maybe...there are people out there who appreciate my words.
Thank you, my friend.
timmy
ps: professional lives rarely |
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You can write this out
to anyone you want.
Fill it in, in dollars, gallons, bins.
When the blank is empty, the imagination’s full.
Get into the mood to move. This is where
most art is
discovered. L’Arlésienne.
La Guantanamera.
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The End of Northography
(Posted on 04/09/2009)
Dear talented and dedicated poets:
I am saddened to hear that Northography will end after such a long and successful ride. I have had the pleasure of being part of a group like no other, and I can not express to Britt and all of you enough how much this site has meant to me over the years.
My latest book was a collection of poems inspired by all the stimuli from Northography; however more importantly this site has been the impetus for so many of us writers that could have otherwise feel so alone in this climate at the northern end of the world where we might have otherwise kept silent and to ourselves.
Britt and all of you, I thank you for all you've given me. I will treasure all the incredible voices I've read and re-read for so many weeks, months and years. What a gift we've all been able to share through our community of support, dedication to the written word, and through our investments in insisting our voices are worthy of being heard.
Suzanne Nielsen |
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Yourtown Bank called the other day and offered me this:
zero interest on a poetry loan.
"Zero interest for how long," I asked the banker woman
with the crooked toupe.
"How long does it take you to complete a collection of poetry?"
she asked, head tilted to make things square up.
"A year, at least," I stated. "And that's a leap of faith."
"I heard you've done that, and you gave credit to a brit. A brit from
the North."
"That's Northography," I corrected her. She poked her pen in her hair and it all gently slided in place.
I cleared my throat and said, "I thought you should know." |
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(after Byron)
Farewell—for now! These quiet rooms
Though inhabiting but a dim-lit screen
Will still be made commodious with verse
Through the long months (nay, years?) you pass unseen.
You take the obscure roads—to obscure ends.
But we write on, each in our own study;
And when we meet you out in the great world
We’ll greet you as Creator, Poet, Buddy.
Farewell again—but for a time!
All things pass away—but some return.
This page is a blank check for you to write;
Whatever its value, it is truly earned. |
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From my forbearance, and failure
of warm touch
born Saturday, 3:00 p.m
this date: August 13, 1966.........now, 15,586 days later
Pay to the
Order ........... ...........$1.77
in some empty Well
anywhere
I drop...
from this shell
sweet feelings about being born into it,
a conservative estimate to my mineral contents worth,
a value decreasing with cellular age,
my name used in financial gains or losses by others of it.
...............................Signed, without my mention. |
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It rained in Pittsburgh. Sunny, but breezy
on the coasts. Clouds circled Hawaii & a dozen
violet crocuses bloomed. Windows sighed open. Fish
followed shafts of light, thought about frenzy.
A coal train the length of North Dakota traveled west.
The U.P. took off its winter coat, white pines shook
out their branches, a black fly knocked on my window,
five crows raced to the sun. I left my socks on the
sidewalk, walked barefoot in my boots. You were playing
on the radio as the stars burnt holes in the sky, & I
dreamed I was a bird, you held in your cupped hands
& that you gave me, the sweetest song.
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This is a dream, that I could fly to you
and hold your hand, would it slow down
the urgency of the inevitable?
How many times we have said good-bye to
each other and how many times I have
come back to you, wanting more,
and there is always the temptation
to believe there is meaning in
suffering, even in sin.
Next to the river I wept, drowning
my anger in white wine and
wishing for the courage to leap
and disappear. On the beach
we slept despite a fierce wind,
and later, laughed and shrieked
while the waves splashed over us
and my shirt filled with sea water and sand.
Grateful because it felt as though
our masks had fallen away.
But it was just that this once you
were all mine and no one else
stood between us. If I had a million
dollars it might not buy a cure
but it would give us some measure
of comfort. I would drop everything
and go to you, this one last time.
I will be there soon, I promise.
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Portrait of youth, emerging, through this artist's eye
my work primarily of family and friends
giving you the things they are wanting
and to own their pose for me,
..... to smile or not, a face as blank for all to see.
Fastidious, a proud practice, my drawing's craft
out of my own sense of vanity… no other greater story than now,
seeking to know you: Johns or Janes
remind me how life has an end,
.....come around and mean what you say to leave as legacy.
Art, like people diverse in background,
is as a life lived as a portfolio of investment
in leisure pursuits, reflect the name that you-made-for-yourself
use your image and idea to become who you are.
.....become the smile of your themes, infuse pastime with this means.
My drawings expand beyond real
you can see how I’ve poeted
see yourself as art
maybe explore mood, emotion, and being;
.....comment and leave me your interesting exploring notions.
Create your smart stride at first Look
one truly outstanding, couldn’t-have-done-it-better glance
impress to make it, in the world, now a better place,
in the scene, your future notoriety commented
.....find me at Andre Deus Whats Good Art Scene.com or Art Slant.com.
Networking, trust in me offering you something first… 60 seconds
find out who you are through your homepage or web site;
learn about you and what you want the World to know about
through works of art you may be interested in commissioning.
.....I’m looking to see what can be found on you.
Share your personal information,
give love of who you are in business and family life.
Let us succeed in this community of artists living and thriving, here
I give the best artwork, and in exchange for stimulus fees,
.....lets salon your character, visual concepts and ideas.
Consider the dimension, medium and the time I need to create
from photography, to draw or sculpt you in ways,
Notwithstanding some private use, copied only with you consent
under my legal name, Eric Eugene Damien Deiss, meet Andre the novice poet
.....send me signed check, with permission to determine your arts use.
My drawings expand beyond real
You can see how I’ve poeted
see yourself as art
maybe explore mood, emotion, and being;
.....comment and leave me your interesting exploring notions.
Best regards with hope to see you in the future!
Andre Deus is now available on Mars
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An hour before dusk, Friday, mid April
sun struck pellucid clouds,
cottonwoods, birches laced with light,
aroma of blue sky, bell clear,
hard as a river in your lungs
which is why you are breathless again,
grateful as if it were the banks of the Seine
that you strolled and not the prairie
back of the Midwest.
To visit means to both comfort and afflict,
but it is a passing thing.
That charm of finches rising from a ditch
surprises you with a sound like
horselips as they paddle toward the oaks,
small, ordinary as dust or seeds,
but they too must sing on earth.
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All this time
the lost and found box
at church has contained:
a plaid woolen scarf;
two pairs of fancy reading glasses;
a Celtic cross necklace;
one pink and blue striped shoe lace;
a neon green plastic water bottle;
and one size 7 woman’s tennis shoe.
Rarely do people come looking,
when they do, it’s for something else.
What’s missing mostly stays missing.
What’s found, rarely claimed.
All genuine, all forgotten
in a hasty moment,
given up when the brain
went visiting elsewhere,
and the possession left
is no longer possessed,
dropped as if down a rabbit hole
to come out the other side
of a moment
where someone like me
waits to give it back,
to be kind and helpful
and commit a good deed.
The world can be that way—
when something is lost, it is also found.
Someone must always play hero.
Someone in need of saving.
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Check waits blank—
in a cardboard box on a closet shelf.
Even after the fingers come
and takes out the book that holds
Check & the others, sliding them into
a leather checkbook holder, Check waits.
For awhile Check holds the others up,
then comes naked as a jaybird to the surface
where he lies exposed & happy.
Well, as the way things usually go
when one has too much downtime,
Check gets to longing that something
exciting will happen, and one day,
something does. Without further notice,
Check is attacked by something
long, thin & straight that carves
loops into Check’s bare flesh,
assigning him a value: four and
twenty-three one hundredth dollars.
Then without even a casual warning,
Check is ripped off, tossed
into a cash register; later
to be taken out, branded,
and shoved into a plastic bag.
Check bounces then—
from side to side, up and down,
and hears a thonk
when the bag is dropped
into something metal & hard
where it lies on its side until unzipped.
Check is pulled out, tramp-stamped,
& thrust unbalanced into a machine
that shoots Check back & forth
while zipping whore-red ink
across his front & backside.
Next Check is placed, seared & sore,
into a drawer with the others
where for awhile it’s dark but calm.
For no apparent reason, one day, they’re lifted
out in a stack & shoved into the tight space
of an envelope. With little air in a world behind
a curtain, they lie in close quarters that are
far too intimate for anyone’s liking,
except fifty two one hundredth dollars
who likes to play a little grab-ass.
Then the envelope is zapped really quick
through another machine that blisters it
(and thank God not the checks).
Next thing he knows, Check is smashed
to the side of the envelope by a thumb,
& since Check had wound up on the top
of all the rest, he can see through
as the envelope is given to a set of eyes
to be placed in some sort of bin
with other various sized envelopes.
Later the thumb comes back & Check
is again thrown against the inside
of the envelope, just as the eyes of another
takes the envelope from the first.
Fear flushes through Check.
The new eyes are the same as the ones
that held the scary, long, straight thing
that had named Check: four and
twenty-three one hundredths dollars.
For awhile Check finds himself safe
on a solid surface in the unopened envelope.
Finally the envelope is opened into air thick & sweet.
The eyes gaze down at Check, flicking back & forth,
& Check relaxes, thinking himself handsome.
All of the sudden, Check is flipped over,
& another is placed on Chuck’s back.
Chuck aches with the weight, but keeps count (77)
as one by one, others are stacked on him.
Then the stack is flipped & Check’s back gets to be
on someone else’s stomach, & for a moment, life is good.
Check lies exhausted, naked and tattooed,
numbered by not defined, and feels as if
all the foolishness may just have come to an end.
But we don’t speak about what came next.
Suffice it to say Check, unsuspecting,
is carried to a slat open like a winking eye,
that growls and has vicious crosscutting teeth.
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Must it be a poem
that feels the warmth of one
spread in blood across the page;
ricocheting splinters rest where ink dries
and we the tiny matches,
are all that keep the light? |
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| I wish all of you the very best. I have enjoyed each day that I have been a part of this community. Thank you for welcoming me in to your artistic homes. I agree with Diana, please stay in touch. jfilitz@gmail.com |
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Dead stars keep sending
to us who live and always lose
their blank checks of light.
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She opened the north door
sixty-some times in two years
to pin her words upon the walls
some days she did not share
pining to be like them
she only looked
at what others had hung
better than any school
or writers' workshop
she thinks
as she pushes in the last thumbtack
posts her last post
now
though the house is closed and quiet
the link only appears to be broken
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Stimulus.
Check.
Response.
Check.
Write poem.
Check.
Say Good-bye.
Check.
(and thanks).
That’s a Check,
Mates.
(Finis)
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Taking leave - also known as vacation, sabbatical, or, metaphorically, insanity. In this case, only leaving one thing for another, consolidating efforts towards strengthening the foundation of existence. Earth, air, fire, water.
I was interrupted. Incoming groceries! Quick – carry potato chips and cases of pop into the cellar. Now away! OK – for a few seconds there, before the car pulled into the driveway, I felt something. I’ve felt that way before, when I write. Maybe like Rilke or Byron felt. One can imagine. So now it’s gone again.
Oh, wait. Something else came up, and I can’t remember what it was. But at least, I remember I was writing. But what about? The scream of Harleys on Highway 169 on a spring day? All these T-shirts I have to give away? Birds, back from the South. Exhaustion from adrenalin dreams that overcame me last night. Tonight, I’ll double the dope, kill them. The mind might feel sluggish the next day, but with no rest one just breathes until it’s over. I’m just breathing. Daily meditation is preferable to medication.
Let’s all say that together.
Daily meditation is preferable to medication.
Again.
Daily meditation is preferable to medication.
Good morning, class. Today, we will study our dreams. There are three kinds of dreams –
The ones that you remember and enjoy
The ones that you can’t recall, and
The ones that keep you up all night. Like this one:
On Wallace Breem's novel, "Eagle in the Snow"
In a dream that makes me sweat,
I observe the fall of Rome.
Determined Germans tear down walls
built of timber, earth and stone.
They destroy Caesar's legions
and sack what empire left behind,
dragging chests of gold through streets
where pools of blood and wine combine.
Now I walk the broken rooks
of Scotland, China and Berlin
and see in darkened stones
how all have reached a dismal end.
But new palisades in Palestine
and Mexico are erected,
as monuments to those
who think they have protected.
Unfortunately, I really do have dreams like this, sometimes in verse. Maybe I should read some Woody Allen or Richard Brautigan next time. I would laugh and laugh myself to sleep, never knowing anxiety. Someone would say to ask God about this. God – now there’s a deity. Most of us stay away from religion when we write, for one of two reasons.
We might go to Hell.
We think it’s silly.
Well, God doesn’t think it’s silly, but I have a reasonable opinion. No one is going to Hell for not agreeing with everything written in a book, or, for that matter, for not believing what some other human tells you you’re supposed to believe. So there you have it. My new religion. What shall we call it? Backyardology? The Eternal Brotherhood of Spiritual Enlightenment? Whistling Shadism?
Dinner is almost ready. I am hungry. This is what it boils down to – a sauce that you can’t forget. A few pages of words that begin, and suddenly, with no warning, end. |
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Saying good-bye
is better than imagining
the numbers of a blank check
or weeping over dead gods
It’s a place to end a story
or a nature walk or folding
the blank white pages
of unwritten poetry
into white handkerchiefs
Some say there are dark
dreams in every house:
in the pockets of jackets
hanging loose from closet
hooks, in drawing rooms,
or in parlors with silver tea
sets on glass tops; unused
Some say there are dark
secrets in certain words
of playwrights: the spaces
between the moments
before certain words speak
the truth of the actors
(Sample from Act II, Scene i:
Professor Bravo: Am I supposed
to be afraid of you? I am, you know.
Perhaps this is a good time
to say ‘good bye’)
If after these words are said
and one feels inclined to leave,
this is the time I want to be
placed under glass |
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On my page,
now running
two-and-one-half years long
A list of so many poems
I would not
otherwise
have penned.
That I write poems
at all
That I can even
make that claim . . . .
Only now,
on the slick salty rim of loss
can I appreciate
just how much
I took
from this place.
How could I miss just
how important
a prompt
would be?
How could I miss how
critical an audience
to motivation?
How did I miss
how instructive,
how supportive is
this electronic,
artistic community
of generous, kindred spirits
sharing talents,
time
sharing hearts.
How could I miss
so completely
just how much
I’ll be missing now?
-------
With so many thanks,
much fondness,
and a bit of sadness
My best wishes to all.
mc/cm
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Listen to the wind.
Sometimes much more fearful than
the absence of light. |
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Thank you all for being part of my welcome to Minnesota. So many mornings, Northography gave me a smile, things to ponder, connection to the world outside while I was stuck inside, a way to stay inspired, a place where I felt I belonged. Mi casa es tu casa, please stay in touch!
Wendy
poetaluna @ yahoo.com |
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My son says, on the way home from school today,
Spain would be a good place to die. Which got me thinking
about bull rings, and certain deaths, and how all deaths
are not equal and that all deaths are not even unpleasant.
Of course, the thought was interrupted when he said,
or was that Finland?
A good place to die? Finland? I asked.
Not die, mom, Dive. It was Finland, although he dove
in Spain too. But Finland was a better place to dive.
They had a really high platform--one you could kill yourself
on. And it was cold, although warm, for Finland.
Unlike Spain, where water is always welcome.
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| any of you are unwilling to let go of this wonderful community, I've reserved an office at Zoetrope.com, entitled Northography Revisited -- an alternative gathering place for displaced Northographers. If you're game, register at www.zoetrope.com, then shoot me a |
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the sun
the blue
the words, entwined
a chain link fence
a crossed leg
a twig, twisted
like the leave-less april tree
like the lines in bed sheets
like the hair of bicycle-man, open-mouth
pedals-water
woman-sunglasses
car-forgotten, I LIVE
IN A CITY
IN A DORMITORY
IN A COOL CELLAR, the bottom of every word spoken
will split open like a C-section, into the earth
oh, the cool earth, oh the cool earth.
stimuli die, chilled and weed-like
my hand once grabbed red hair and cereal out of the box
surely poems were never written
by worms, hungry, hungry, hungry, hungry for
the smell of
an orange.
now, imagine death. |
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I was once on this boat
in the middle of nowhere
listening to singing voices
through the plastic roof
of my luxury box-size luxury cabin.
The rest of the passengers
spent their nights drinking
the width of the river, wild gulps of it
a drink many times richer
than any of their possessions
but clearly narrower than their dreams
or my own, for tha matter.
The songs they sang were parts of a poem
in a language I used to know well
but in a form so free that it sounded almost sacred.
I have been away from that river for a long time
away from the little kids in their wooden canoes
from the brown water and the green lush of the forests
but I often hear similar poems here
so thanks to you all:
For those of you, who shared your rivers, your boundaries
your sacred and playful writings with me, thank you.
For the ones who read my songs, thanks and
for, you, the one who once invited me
my greatest gratitude for helping me use images
to revisit my past. Thanks for providing the boat
(and the drinks), Britt. |
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. . . is in the mail
Easy for you to say
as you turn out the lights
and slip out the back door
leaving your unfinished guests
to peer into the windows
Wouldn't it be strange
to assuage the now word hungry
with a blank check to each
that odd bit of paper promise
with ink as coin of the realm
I wonder what you would get
bouncing back to you in return
six syllable lines ending in prepositions?
every fourth line rhymed with dollars?
three haikus endorsed on the back?
but surely signed - tanka |
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On my bookcase is a vase flower:
delphinium; the one hummingbirds
love, the one name I can't remember
beneath it, on the second shelf,
a snow globe, glass smooth,
gleaming as polished bone,
sits on the far left end, next
to the poetry of Keats, faded
pages of odes as bitter
and melancholy as falling
stars or small tears of love;
little things the heart soaks up:
sugar pastes, bridal jewelry;
words ultimately crushed
by a lonely man’s tender hands.
Next to Keats is Stephen Crane
in his open boat jacket, a book
with a weakened spine; words
about something to misinterpret:
afterlife, perhaps; a writer’s dream
in a world he himself made
a world filled with ill-fated captains
and a god that doesn’t exist. |
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Our line awaits
An open mouth, a stroke
Yearning for ink and green
A slip of paper to change worlds.
Some needs met,
Some less so.
There's a poetry among these numbers
That need a name, a date, a memo
Something to amount to.
Books open and close and there is occasional profit
Mosaic as nations named and dreamt. |
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There once was an economic crisis
Made worse by GW His Mightiness
Now our pain of need
Due to privileged greed
Shall bring checks meant to give our economy some impetus!
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It could be any of us.
This moment, the very next day, or next month.
"For me?!" answered by "yes, if you're Jane or John
Doe. Then it's yours, to write, to owe.
Not quite carte blanche."
Then the smile.
Money in the bank,
For those that have it.
Money before the checks run out –
Or was it the other way around?
You know what I mean.
I hear your laughter.
Not so easy these days.
Tighten the belts, make the dollar stretch, too.
Not let on to little ones how things are.
They need to learn to earn things, anyway.
Let's play Shop at the Merc, instead.
Hundred Tootsie Rolls for a buck!
They're phasing things out nowadays.
"Do they take checks here anymore?"
"I think so – wait, can't remember when
I last used one…" "Let's try it anyway –
There's an ATM over there, if not."
Do you have a pen? |
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for Stan,
after Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill’s ‘What Foremothers?’
Whatever makes him the man, the mensch,
who looks a woman in her eyes, not breasts,
he’s the one in the pub applauding
when the poet’s daughter caps
her father’s half a quatrain with her own:
‘It flew from my tongue like a hummingbird.’
Not waiting for his foamy beer to settle,
her father swills it down in just one gulp.
He’d bragged about the way she poured the brew
and said she’d make some man a tender spouse,
but now he feels she’ll never marry
and what is worse, she’ll have no son
to bear the family’s gift and burden—poetry.
Poet, file, dependable, masculine,
is a noun you can count on. ‘My daughter, a file mna?
A poet-woman is a scold!’ he says. ‘Worse than females
singing rebel songs! Woman, you’ve a finer role
as goddess, Queen of Sovereignty!’
An Fíreán doesn’t clap with the literati
for the father’s speech, but raises his hand
for silence and says, ‘Your daughter’s work
is even better written than extempore.
'If no chieftain gives her parchment, or requires her
to praise his virtues, ghost his speeches, all the better.
In a marriage of equals, I’ll be her scribe and publisher!’
A businessman, he couldn't time his heart to quatrains,
but she loved him well in bed and at table; she extolled
his wise-guy head, so comical with curls; his eyes
so black they pulled her in as she did him and they never
tired of the way he entered and she took him in, and she
entered his eyes and he opened his soul,
her man, her mensch, An Fíreán.
‘File’ means poet, and ‘file mna’ is a woman poet. An Fíreán is an upstanding person (the root is ‘fir’ meaning ‘men.’).
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Some background on the poem I posted: Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill, who writes poetry in Irish, wrote an article to reply to Anne Stevenson, an American poet living in Ireland, who claimed that modern women poets in Ireland had foremother poets. Ni Dhomhnaill tells the father-daughter story in this poem to illustrate the Irish legend that if a daughter wrote poetry, poetry would be gone from the family for seven generations. I’m writing a ms. about Irish goddesses, and I didn’t want it to be unbalanced, so I wrote this love poem to my husband and added a mensch, a Fíreán, the man, a true Obama or a Britt, to Nuala’s story.
Like the businessman in my poem, I can’t time my heart to quatrains, but thank you everyone for your poetry and your help in shaping my poems. I’ve learned from you, and we’ll meet again, I’m sure, if not in person on the internet. I’m at pbbarone@juno.com.
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Subtlety, loosened canons cash
lost tongues smoking lanterns of Mars
hallowed flower at twenty three knots
freed these tethered black pearls.
In trust, God we opened Her
with sweetly uncertain knots
if we’re imagined without milk’s honey
our green mast undone and fails.
Fidelity and loyalty back these winds
for The Phaedra is sailed into a mean season
freely pours a sweetly divine Sun
razors shine upon her heart
gently gathered for fun.
Trade her Capricorn the Leo will bleed
A class of ship conserved elegant sword,
leaving admired curtain kept
my wanderin flames
a pride of these Southern affection streams.
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