Poetry

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Lost

I really have been lost, you know
Once in the woods on LSD
Because the trees turned evil
And didn’t know me anymore

So I sat.

Once downtown between scrapers
I turned down an alley
I came out in a new place
But I kept walking
And it was too late
It wasn’t my city
And it was big

I called for help.

Once, driving to a reunion
I missed a turn on the highway
Next exit 67 miles
The panic at night
I didn’t have the number
And got off and back on
Then couldn’t find the house
I stayed in a motel

Alone.

Then there was the moment
I realized I was lost
Not in a place
Or looking for one
But me
I lost myself
I sat alone calling for help

And nobody came.

And I’m looking hard.

5610. NuPlanetOne - 3/7/2006 10:04:48 PM

OK. I have finished a poem. I know, I have posted over a hundred here over the years. Yet hitherto, I have never really, officially nor seriously, edited or pained over the final shape each one should take. JamesWright tried many times to get me, as well as others, to realize that our various first drafts were just the beginning of the task. If you could liken a keen sense for poetic structure and content to that of the fine palate in an oenologist, then its likeness is our Mr. Wright.

Of course, Maria G did insist on serious revision and changes when we collaborated briefly back in the day, but I just acquiesced mainly because I was infatuated with her brilliance and feminine allure, rather than any serious attempt to better my poetry. She castigated me on this very point and might have even been flattered, but her explanation of my dilettantish attitude toward writing had more to do with my non-committal nature in general, dooming me to obscurity, (She said that!), unless I took the pain to understand the work involved in really good poetry. Like I wasn’t even more smitten! Ha! Have I mentioned that I miss her?

Anyway, the following is a before and after of a piece I put here before. I liked it then, but it was really, quite flawed. I still am not sure I made my point except to stress the main idea is a notion, not serious science, but an observation run amok in the afterthought of passing by the scene. So, if you are bored, and at your leisure, comment. Is at least the new style more effective? I felt that at least it had a style, as a lot of mine are run ons with lazy line breaks, just a block of marble holding promise sustained by conceit.

5611. NuPlanetOne - 3/7/2006 10:05:50 PM

Beware The Crows (original)

Why did the squirrel just stop?
He had it made. They all do that
It is why some crows chase them
Out there. One keeps him from
The tree. One forces him into the
Road. They goad and place him
In danger. It seems that all creatures
With intelligence use it for gain
As if the only purpose of a brain
Is to conquer. Is to sustain a being
No matter the cost. Always fleeing
The smarter predator. Given
That some creatures are driven
To act out of sheer kindness, humans
For example. This is intelligence,
Perhaps, also evolved for survival
One of the more subtler features
Of flesh and bone. Sharing and caring
And writing it down. Where evil
Has become the crows. Perched
Staring at the picture. Devising. Searched
For weakness. Revising. Swooping
Eating the kill with drooping head
And malevolent eyes. For it knows
It’s business, as it knows the dead.
Beware the crows.


Beware the Crows

Why did the squirrel
Just stop?
It had it made
They all do that

It is why the crows
Chase them
Out there
One keeps it
From the tree
One forces it
Into the road
They goad and place it
In danger

It seems that all creatures
With intelligence
Use it for gain
As if the only purpose
Of a brain
Is to conquer
Is to sustain
A being
No matter the size
Always fleeing
The smarter predator

Given
That several creatures
Are driven
To act out of sheer kindness
Humans, for example
This is intelligence
Perhaps
Also evolved for survival
Pure altruism
An anomalous feature
Of flesh and bone
Within a creature, merciful
Civilizing. Sharing and caring
And writing it all down

Where evil, pure animal
Incubates
Tweaking in crows
Waiting to evolve
Mutating. Perched
Staring at the picture
Devising
Searched
For weakness
Revising
Swooping
Gouging the kill
With a malevolent
Craning head
And T-Rex
Machiavellian eyes
For it knows
Its business
As it devours the dead
Beware the crows.

5612. arkymalarky - 3/9/2006 12:18:54 AM

Very nice, Nu. I like the way the change affects the sound and sense.

James Wright--there's someone I'd love to see back in here.

5613. arkymalarky - 3/9/2006 12:19:52 AM

Sense as in sensation.

5614. jexster - 3/17/2006 8:48:14 AM

Zapped Flashbacks...Mid Life Crisis

Mid Life Crisis



She had that
Camarillo brillo
Flamin’ out along her head,
I mean her mendocino bean-o
By where some bugs had made it red

She ruled the toads
Of the short forest
And every newt in idaho
And every cricket who had chorused
By the bush in buffalo

She said she was
A magic mama
And she could throw a mean tarot
And carried on without a comma
That she was someone I should know

She had a snake for a pet
And an amulet
And she was breeding a dwarf
But she wasn’t done yet
She had gray-green skin
A doll with a pin
I told her she was awright
But I couldn’t come in
(I couldn’t come in right then...)

And so she wandered
Trough the door-way
Just like a shadow from the tomb
She said her stereo was four-way
An’ I’d just love it in her room

Well, I was born
To have adventure
So I just followed up the steps
Right past her fuming incense stencher
To where she hung her castanets

She stripped away
Her ranchid poncho
An’ laid out naked by the door
We did it till we were un-concho
An’ it was useless any more

She had a snake for a pet
And an amulet
And she was breeding a dwarf
But she wasn’t done yet
She had gray-green skin
A doll with a pin
I told her she was awright
But I couldn’t come in
(actually, I was very busy then)

And so she wandered
Trough the door-way
Just like a shadow from the tomb
She said her stereo was four-way
An’ I’d just love it in her room

Well, I was born
To have adventure
So I just followed up the steps
Right past her fuming incense stencher
To where she hung her castanets

She said she was
A magic mama
And she could throw a mean tarot
And carried on without a comma
That she was someone I should know

(is that a real poncho...i mean
Is that a mexican poncho
Or is that a sears poncho?
Hmmm...no foolin’ ...)

5615. NuPlanetOne - 3/18/2006 3:30:23 PM

jex. Zap was the man.


...ain't no way to delay
that trouble comin' every day
...and if a millon more agree
there ain't no great society

...what's the ugliest part
of your body?
...some say your nose
...some say your toes
but i think it's your mind
...your mind...your mind
ooo...ooo...ooo

...it don't mean shit to a tree.


Zappa. Freak Out. (69?)

He was like a Confucius.

5616. NuPlanetOne - 3/18/2006 3:31:28 PM

...I love this girl

Amanda Leigh Lichtenstein

Picture This

Coins and shoelaces
Car keys and clouds

Picture the day
You returned home

Father's dark toenail
Fell off, finally --

Placed on the mantel
Microscope close

Old men shed layers
Of skin and then

Picture the day
Your father dies

And you do not fly
Home – not yet.

A perilous sort of paralyzed
Two eyes, quizzical

A sorrow mirror:
Ghosts sleep in the shower.

First you turn off the lights.
Then you remember your toes.

Tickets arranged, click-click.
Airports full of asthma.

Your father is dead,
All his music stacked

High in sex-closets
Stuffed with feathers.

You box-drag endless
To the curb – and he

Coughs from the porch
Clapping his hands, windless.

*************


Leaving

Adios to the louses who invented longing

Sayonara to the silent narrator in our lives

Livid is the girl who thought she knew the language

Anguished over the age and freshness of the day

A to Z an alphabet of dusk and haze to grope

The interloping hexagon of faith

Goodbye to the good eye and the good lie

Arrivederci to the cherry tree and her fruits

Kwa heri to the hurry lurking in our toes

Languid is the girl who thought she knew to swirl

See ya soon you sea of sighs

Keep in touch, you caped and weary cantor

I'll cry for you Argentina, Eva Peron!

I'll sketch your likeness in white

Totezines you xenophobes who played your oboes

Farewell airy wellspring of fever

Talk to you later all you skating stalkers

Write me while camel riding at sunrise

Call me and cull me a future we'll cheer
So long my letter to forever

**********************

Another Time


Back snapped like time capsule

Bursting with dust from the good old days



Bracketed and packaged in saran wrap,

Parceled and stamped fresh to study



The hair and skin, who needed it? I emptied

The belly of wanting and insisted on despair



I steered the horse into water to see it swim,

Pressed play on its whinny and wondered



Paused its disastrous attempts, the bending

Of knees and eyes wide in horror – oh, dark



Cloud where are you to complete the mood?

I wouldn't look at what was sad, not then.



The hands fold into a second glance, fists

Like knots of crystal waving in the dark



I need to accept boats as decent modes

Of transport and forget the gallant horse.



Accept maps as representations

And not itself any sort of real plan.


I know the difference when I try to call home:

The numbers disappear inside my mouth.

5617. phillipdavid - 3/18/2006 4:14:17 PM

NuPlanetOne,
Re 5611
" Is at least the new style more effective? I felt that at least it had a style..."

No.

Your original style is (and always has been!) incredibly effective.

Your original has movement...the first half of the poem is written in such a way to accentuate words at the end of lines; then in the middle words toward the begining of lines are accentuated, then at the end the acentuated words mingle, and this creates a wonderful circular confluence. Form helps function.

For example: stop, them, from, him,

and then: humans, perhaps, one flesh, writing, become

and then: head, knows, dead,

and then: beware the crow

Your style has always worked for me. I just read one of your poems (A New Head) to a class of 6th graders to show them how the rhyme and rhythm and accent can be created in the middle of lines and doesn't have to follow more traditional forms (I introduced them to poetry using Emily Dickenson and Robert Frost), and sometimes this works to great effect because it stirs your mind to contemplate ideas suggested in the middle.

I hope that made sense to you.
Your poems have always made sense to me!

5618. arkymalarky - 3/18/2006 4:51:31 PM

Hey PD!

Good to see you're still at it.

5619. NuPlanetOne - 3/20/2006 7:51:33 PM

Well thank you Mr. David. And it’s real cool to hear that my humble scribblings can be used in any way to further the enjoyment of the two authors you mentioned. And you are right, I have decided. One of my favorite styles is mid rhyme and alliterating and end rhyme followed by front rhyme followed by blank verse..ect. And as always, ‘punch line poetry’ if I may coin a name for my favorite working premise and structure, that is, portray the essence of the thought and ride it down the page to, usually, an abrupt closure. The attempt in the crow poem to traditionalize the stanzas was just aping structure. I have abandoned that precept. Others here have mastered it, as it fits their true style. Seamus, for example. His most recent offerings and reworks if you read back in here show incredible progress. Very polished, but more important, very effective and compelling poetry.

And yes, it makes perfect sense to me. My deviation in form and structure does not hinder you from ‘getting it.’ I probably still need a new head though. (^_^)

5620. RickNelson - 3/21/2006 6:32:03 AM

Nu, I concur with your regard for Maria and JW. Truly missed.

Regarding your poem. I rather like the first writing, yet can follow both.

I've just plopped some words down, and haven't considered much mending them yet. As usual, I rarely do.



Hopes and aspirations, without contingent controversy.
The whiles of a clear mind. Set into pattern,
complimentary attitudes; whilst delaying dissatisfactions.
There is vast expanse there, tillable, rich soil.
Sagacity plays distant tunes, and distracts,
a form of sheer raiment billows, unsettles the mind,
There is compelling gesture and articulation,
loosed to trundle, having a close and detectable scent.
Some guise to lay companion and guest at ease.
Where this confounded conundrum of cacophonous comparison, creates confusion?

5621. wonkers2 - 3/31/2006 4:35:27 PM

Jack's House by Hart Seely

These are the men
That fleeced the tribes
That paid the money
That made the bribes
That purchased the Congress that
Jack Built.

This is the Duke
That sailed the yacht
That raised the eyebrows
And got him caught,
Who helped Mitch Wade,
Who bought Duke's land
And kicked in 700 grand;
Which raised Duke's taxes,
And gave Duke pain;
So Wade paid the tab
On Duke's capital gain.
Bigger than Abscam:
Randy "Duke" Cunningham!
Top gun in the Congress that
Jack built.

This is Bob Ney,
Who knew the fine print
That could pass a casino
And rev up its mint,
Who spawned the email
Where Jack foretold:
"Just met with Ney.
"We're fucking gold!"
And Ney in 2000,
A moment quite checkered
Ripped magnate Gus Boulis
In the Congress'nal Record.
His tirade was meant
To frighten the fellow,
Who cops say was shot
By Big Tony Moscatiello,
Who got a small fortune
From Jack's pal in D.C.,
A guy Ney said was known
For his "honesty."
Their pal was indicted
And then copped a plea
Guilty of fraud
And conspiracy.
For creating the vibes
That condoned the bribes
That corrupted the Congress that
Jack built.

This is DeLay,
Who built the machine
That redrew the distreicts
And raised the green,
That decided the races
That claimed the new seats,
That made the new friends
That owned luxury suites,
That held big galas
That brought the donations
That helped him to greet
The great Coushatta Nation!
with 800 members
And fund-stream support
From the famous Coushatta Casion
Resort!
Which paid several million
For Jack to abort
A rival tribe's parlor
In nearby Shreveport,
Which prompted the letter
That outlined their claims
That went to Gale Norton,
Co-signed by these names:
Tom DeLay, Eric Cantor,
Royo Blunt, the chief whip,
Speaker Dennis Hastert.
That's the House leadership!
They played the game
And wears the shame
That hangs over the Congress that
Jack built.

This is the Jack,
Jack Abramoff,
Who bought the souls,
Then sold them off,
Who shook the hands
And financed the houses
And feted the staffs
And hired the spouses,]
And fleeced the tribes
And spread the bribes
That ransomed the Congress that
Jack built.

5622. Ulgine Barrows - 4/1/2006 9:38:02 AM

NuPlanetOne, given that I hate squirrels about as much as rats, I liked the first version best.
The whole premise of your work, crows outlasting squirrels.....I dunno.
I guess I'll go have to watch some more. Last I looked, the squirrels were winning.
The crows are bombing because the squirrels are attacking the crow's nests, but what the hell do I know.

5623. Ulgine Barrows - 4/1/2006 9:52:26 AM

Maybe it's a cyclic, neigborhood phenomenon.

5624. Jenerator - 4/4/2006 9:20:13 PM

NuPlanetOne, memories of Maria and a Phillip David sighting.

That's poetry.

5625. Ulgine Barrows - 4/6/2006 5:27:27 AM

And that's politics, mentioning Maria and Phillip David yet nothing of the content, isn't it?

Glad to see ya in the poetry thread after all these years, Jenerator.

5626. Ulgine Barrows - 4/6/2006 5:46:52 AM

bow down before the one you serve.
you're going to get what you deserve.
bow down before the one you serve.
you're going to get what you deserve


God money's not looking for the cure.
God money's not concerned about the sick amongst the pure.
God money let's go dancing on the backs of the bruised.
God money's not one to choose

~Nine Inch Nails

5627. NuPlanetOne - 4/9/2006 3:26:16 AM

…yes, Ulgine. It is nice to see Jenerator hereabouts. Back in the day I could count on some nice words from her and some mutual flirtations. Course, then she up and married and procreated and flew off across the pond. And I thought I had a shot at her! Oh well.

..Hi Jen. Yes, PD did stop by with input on my style crisis, (I value his take as he has followed my progress from the get go, as have you), and I can’t help but reminisce on Maria as she had faithfully served as my muse, in a sense, in this virtual anonymity in which we exist here. I just never expected anyone could die here. Damn reality! You are still married? (Smiling wryly)

5628. arkymalarky - 4/9/2006 5:10:33 AM

I will always associate the Poetry thread with memories of Maria, Cigarlaw and Verdeazul.

Poetry