Of sounds, there seems a widow’s cruse
to knock around, to interfuse.
This rhyming dervish -so accused-
from Albany to Syracuse
or Monterey to Santa Cruz
across the water -if you choose-
but not so far as Betelgeuse.
I do not wish to disabuse
you of your preference -p’s and q’s-
but only that I’m circumfused
with words whose sounds are overused.
******************
a list of words presented themselves…and I just couldn’t stop.
Today would have been Charles Bukowski’s 93rd birthday*. Ever since I started writing poetry, I’ve had a fascination with Bukowski: His writing style, his curmudgeonly persona. He had a very rough childhood, with a strict upbringing, and episodes of bullying. Some say he suffered from dyslexia, which contributed to depression and his subsequent alcoholism. He suffered early rejection in his writing career and even gave it up for a time. Eventually, he returned to writing with a distinct style. He’s not the kind of writer that appeals to everyone…you either love or hate him. His poetry can be very blunt and crass, but at the same time, insightful to the plights and depravity of everyday urban living. I don’t want to glorify the lifestyle**, yet, his ability to condense his own issues into compelling poetry can’t be denied. He rarely made use of metaphor and subtlety, but relied solidly on direct language, anecdotes, and his own experiences.
I don’t want to run the risk of violating someone’s copywrite, so I won’t share any of his poems here. But, I’ll direct you to the Poetry Foundation website as a start if you are interested. And these really only scratch the surface. The man was an incredibly prolific author/poet***.
Because I consider Bukowski influential, I’ve been known to “attempt” mimicking his style (for better or for worse) or at least channel him. I think most poets/writers have an influential style that they sometimes attempt.
***************************
*Bukowski died in 1994 from leukemia.
**Among other things, Bukowski wrote of his numerous affairs, sex with prostitutes, violence, drinking, and gambling.
***Bukowski wrote more than forty books of poetry, prose and novels while living. There have been nine compilations of “new” poetry published since his death.
***************
Book Spine Poetry
(upside down) Therapy
April Morning
Rainbow’s End
Killing Time
A Poetry Handbook
90 Minutes in Heaven
Where Good Ideas Come From
when your thoughts get rounded off,
gathering down the slope to the open plateau,
sketches get
relegated to a collection.
Each one appears then fades
-as sounds of thunder dwindles to nothing-
leaving barely enough to fill a bowl.
Maybe the scratched
glass bowl the color of cinnamon,
that you use to mix tuna and mayonnaise
-but without sweet pickles
it is not a salad-
or the majestic porcelain one –
the best bowl to mix flour, water, and yeast.
Cover with a cloth
and let the dough rise -twice its size –
on the stove counter,
or the one
fashioned
from wires
– it holds the apples and oranges,
and keeps from bruising them, but doesn’t work
for tangerines – so you store them
in the original packaging.
Then the bowls you don’t use –
you flip them over in the cabinet-
that way they don’t get dusty inside,
and you can put the spare words
away in a basket
for the day
or in a drawer
with recipe cards,
paper clips, spare buttons
and old keys.
with small hands wrapped around
a father’s thumbs,
looking out onto a horizon
of -things-
yet undefined to a young mind
move to the edges
sounds and things,
as destinations.
Mommy claps.
Just yesterday, you would have lunged
on all fours,
but today you took that step
upright,
foot slung forward
slightly sideways,
and unsure of the placement of it.
Daddy holds on,
as a stride begets another,
and wanting to drop to the floor
you hang on to the moment
and balance
to repeat what you have learned.
Tomorrow, you run.
eleven times out of twelve, what I write turns out to be something totally different than what I started with. I mean, there is much word-smithing with any poem, but most times- eleven days out of twelve- the subject matter changes completely as I scrounge the floor of my brain looking for connecting thoughts to make it sound logical, beautiful, or even nonsensical. This is funny enough – trying to make something sound like it doesn’t make sense – or even silly – by perusing dictionaries or thesauruses (or is it thesauri?). “The Sauri sought to seek the soar-fly.” – I’ll remember that for later- Rooting up old phrases, or trying to describe how old phrases get rooted up…digging and digging, poking at the word order. It is not unlike scavengers looking for food, hogs looking for truffles, squirrels looking for acorns. Most of the time, they know they are looking for food, but sometimes they happen upon other things. I’m not sure how a squirrel would react if it found a penny on the ground when it was looking for acorns. It probably wouldn’t be very useful to the squirrel (or the hog), and they would ignore it. The poet – particularly one who is looking into every detail- could easily be distracted by the penny in lieu of the acorn. Now this is not useful if one is seeking acorns, and squirrels don’t write poems, but most times, eleven times out of twelve, a better poem comes from the unexpected penny.
NaPoWriMo 2013 Day 28 (Catchup)
I heard a lecture
about Rembrandt,
and how he avoided
doing portrait commissions for
so long,
perhaps of the opinion
that he did not need to do them.
-and I learned he spent long hours
working on etchings-
something he enjoyed
more than painting portraits
even with long hours and excrutiating
detail
I’ve rewritten this poem
nine times since that lecture.
NaPoWriMo 2013 Day 27
Open
the mirror’d soul
to speak in blues and green.
Colours of the landscape canvas
grazing
the tales
of old places, new embraces.
Heroes’ travels on crisp
printed paper,
whisper.
NaPoWriMo 2013 Day 19
A response to a prompt to celebrate National Library Week over at Earful of Cider
In the picture
there is an oval mirror,
framed in braided mahogany
and it gives a reflection
of a glass door
-openness to the room-
implying she likes big spaces.
Beneath the mirror sits
a stack of books, fore-edge only showing
-no spines-
so we don’t know the titles
but I’m certain it contains an
old copy of Leaves of Grass
and Through the Looking Glass.
Next to the stack of books
is a dinosaur figurine,
a tyrannosaurus slightly outstretched,
it’s tiny arms not quite reaching…
something
and in the right corner is the front half
of a small silver toy car,
a flashy memento
just coming into the picture.
If only the dinosaur
can reach the stack of books in time,
he will be safe.
I wonder what kind of day it was outside,
when this picture was made.
NaPoWriMo 2013 Day 15
Last week on The Gobbledygook Inters :
In a resemblance to a growing band
Band of apocalyptic marauders,
Survivalist industrialists slowly overtake the only factory along the river
And feed a dose of a miscreant pollutant into the
Waterways.
Meanwhile,
Our hero attempts to negotiate
With the leader of the counterrevolutionaries,
The number of potato guns and associated
Ammunition to be used in the impending attack
Against the increasing numbers
Of the zombie horde.
The network is watching closely
To ensure that ratings don’t overshadow
It ability to fund new episodes.
NaPoWriMo 2013 Day 13
Taps and Ratamacues 