Two Poems and two trees.
11 Feb 2010 1 Comment
in Uncategorized Tags: art, photography, poem, poems, poetry, trees, writing
OK. Here are two more poems. I think they’re pretty straightforward- I gave them both titles for that reason. I’ve kinda been hung up on trees lately..I have no idea why- but I’ve been inspired nonetheless. These two, along with “feet,” the one from my previous post, were inspired by trees. “Feet” from a picture a photographer friend of mine took, and these of a particularly awesome climbing tree(you are NEVER too old to climb trees).So here they are. Let me know what you think…(please):
Things seen from Treetops
Thin clouds melt into the sky like a watercolor.
The horizon is so much farther away
from this vantage point.
Cool wind causes the tributaries of my perch to sway,
just a bit
and rustle.
I lean back, balancing
Cautious, but comfortable.
I take a breath.
Think.
Stop thinking.
Stop thinking about thinking.
Breathe.
Let my mind wonder.
Think of things seen from treetops.
Birds and bugs of course,
The busy residents whom my prescence disturbs.
The sun,
Not yet setting, but lowering herself just enough
To cast long sillouettes
Of trees and people,
Children on bicycles and thier mothers
Having one last go around the park before heading home for dinner.
One uncanny moment of peace
And a realization that this is
Real
And that for one moment,
This moment,
Things seen from treetops
Are the most important things in the world.
————————————————————————————————–
Traveler
Pale blue fades darker,
As but a sliver of the sun remains.
There is something to be said about darkness.
How it creeps up,
Unnoticed.
While I daydreamt , I lost an hour
Or two,
Or more
And all of the sun.
It was light when I left.
When my mind left my body
And my ink left my pen.
I saw the sun set.
My eyes did.
They must have.
But I wasn’t there.
I was gone,
I was elsewhere,
Someplace different,
Somewhere new,
Everywhere,
Anywhere,
Everywhere but here.
Now its darker still-
Deeper blue,
Purple,
Almost black.
Stars start to emerge,
The eyes of daydreamers everywhere,
Opening in the darkness,
Returning from their travels.
two new poems
11 Feb 2010 2 Comments
in Uncategorized Tags: art, poem, poems, poetry, writing
So I was bad yesterday. I didn’t post. Which means I’ll have to make up for it today with two poems. Both are originals. I personally like the first one better than the second. Probably because I wrote the first one first and the second hasn’t had time to grow on me yet. Also the second is a bit of a departure from my usual style. Regardless of my opinion, here they are for your enjoyment(hopefully):
Feet
Cool earth seeps between toes
So desperate for it’s touch
As one breaks from the confines of a shoe,
Followed by its twin.
The shoes are quick forgotten
Accomplices to concrete,
As the feet travel farther
Down unpaved path
Known only by the daring feet
Who came before,
Treading grass to soil,
Inconspicuously.
Bark,
So foreign to fingertips accustomed to plastic,
Styrofoam,
And steel
Causes palms to scream
Jubilant
At a feeling lost,
But so familiar to their heritage.
Scents of coffee,
Gasoline,
And smoke
Waft away into the lightly falling rain
Which adds not only scent,
But sound
To a collection,
Not of cars and trains and
Idle small-talk,
So meaningless and impersonal,
But of wind,
And birds,
And distant scurries
Of creatures hidden but aware
Of a stranger in their midst.
Intrigued,
But afraid,
The stranger turns back
Trying,
With each step,
To commit to memory the feeling of grass,
Around ankles.
Eyes notice shoes,
Waiting in the mud.
One foot,
Then its twin,
Steps onto concrete.
It is so smooth,
So
Hard
But the feet
Can feel it.
And as they move farther
Down the pavement,
The shoes are quick forgotten,
Accomplices to no one.
————————————————————————–
The Chair
There is a chair
In the middle of the room,
Where no one sits.
It is not that they are forbidden.
No.
It is, after all,
A chair,
And chairs are made for sitting.
Nor is it a lack of desire.
The chair looks comfortable enough.
Quite comfortable,
To be honest.
I don’t know why
No one sits in the chair.
All I can say
Is that no one has ever sat there before.
Ever.
Perhaps it’s broken,
And people fear that they will fall.
Perhaps it’s too small,
Or large,
For most people.
Or perhaps it is too low,
Or maybe high.
Perhaps there is no reason at all,
And if that’s the case,
I think I’ll sit,
Because while we’ve been talking,
I’ve grown quite tired of standing.
new poem
07 Feb 2010 2 Comments
in Uncategorized Tags: poem, poems, poetry, random, writing
So here’s my poem for today. This one is another original. I tentatively call it “the end of the world.” I’m torn between that and “the walk ” or something more vague. This is why most of my poems go untitled. I feel like an introduction almost gives them away, or tells the reader what to think. I like the poem itself to tell the story. Anyway, I’ll figure it out. So here it is. Thoughts?
She walks passed tall buildings
city blocks
hot sun
people
cars
sounds, lots of them,
and colors
toward houses
white, with fences
past lawns, trimmed
and flowers
children playing
happy sounds
families
to a barn
quiet sounds
animals, a horse whinnies
cows
a field
the sun is low now
she walks
through the tall grass
dark
small sounds
sweet sounds, crickets
she feels wind now
and light
the sun rises
she walks across pebbles
and sand
warm
calm sounds, the ocean
wet
she walks into the water
forward
no sounds
she walks off the end of the world
a quick poem before I go…
07 Feb 2010 Leave a Comment
Today has been an insame day involving flat tires, sinus headaches, and pretty much driving back and forth across the city- mulitple times… So that dosn’t leave much time to blog. But I’ll get to all that another time. Right now it’s almost one am and I need to be up early, so that still leaves me with little blog time. But I said I was going to post a poem a day(although it is technically tomorrow already) and I will stick to it. So here it is. I found this one in a book of poetry my sister gave me and It just kinda stuck with me- especially because I was just discussing with my fiance today how everyone has different versions of themselves, which they reveal(or don’t reveal) depending on the situation. This poem goes a bit deeper than that, but it seemed to fit:
I am not I
Juan Ramon Jimenez
I am not I.
I am this one
walking beside me whom I do not see,
whom at times I manage to visit,
and at other times I forget;
the one who remains silent while I talk,
the one who forgives, sweet, when I hate,
the one who takes a walk when I am indoors,
the one who will remain standing when I die.
One more poem for tonight
05 Feb 2010 2 Comments
in Uncategorized Tags: love, poem, poems, poetry, writing
This is another one of mine. It actually started out as a love poem(something that I seem incapable of writing) and just morphed and twisted strangely from there. I wrote this one quite a while ago also. Maybe a couple of years ago… anyway, of course I had to put it away and forget about it before I pulled it out again and decided that I actually liked it. So typical… Leave me some feedback if you don’t mind. Here it is:
You defy what they say.
You refuse to conform.
And you are wholly,
Completely,
Rejected.
You have not one friend.
All look down on you.
I dream of your courage.
You haunt my thoughts
With your defiance.
Your strength is my inspiration.
You are so strong
To simply live
In an entirety that refuses to acknowledge
Your wisdom, your spirit, your truth.
All hate you.
I love you.
But if they knew,
Disaster.
I would be scorned.
A separation,
An isolation,
My weak heart could never bear.
So I, too, must hate you.
Another poem
05 Feb 2010 1 Comment
in Uncategorized Tags: poem, poems, poetry
I think I will start doing a poem a day. Or more. whatever suites my mood. Either one of mine or just something I come across that strikes me. This one is a short one, but so powerful. It says everything it needs to say. I think the shortness of it actually makes the point.
Christopher Logue
English poet
Come to the edge.
We might fall.
Come to the edge.
It’s too high!
COME TO THE EDGE!
And they came,
and he pushed,
and they flew.
Alternative Billboards
04 Feb 2010 Leave a Comment
in Uncategorized Tags: 30 seconds to mars, music
I posted last week that my new favorite song was Kings and Queens by 30 seconds to mars.
And…. I just found out that it is number one on the alternative billboard chart(and number 6 on the rock chart).
Congrats guys. 
an old poem
04 Feb 2010 2 Comments
in Uncategorized Tags: camp, fine arts, poem, poems, poetry, summer
Continuing with the poetry theme I seem to have going here, I actually think I’ll post one of my own.
I wrote the original version of this poem when I was… I don’t know… maybe fifteen?? I remember I was a camper at fine arts camp(the same one I teach at now). I never really did anything with it. Just stashed it away with other “camp memories.” Then i found it again last year, actually still liked it, and revamped it a bit.
It is as of yet untitled. Let me know what you think. I’d love some feedback:
There is movement.
Footsteps.
They create a chorus.
No movement can be distinguished
From another.
And voices,
That carry across rooms and down streets.
They blend together,
Each statement so trivial,
In the incoherent blur.
There is light:
Blinding,
Penetrating every crack in the street,
Every corner in every wall.
The features of every face
Are overcome,
Shapeless in the bright rays.
A rebellious cloud moves slowly in from the east,
Staining the clear sky.
One drop,
Then
Rain splatters down the once dry walls.
A window, once filled with light,
Shuts.
And the rain continues on.
The rain lasts, and with each passing minute grows
More violent.
Thunder roars.
And lightning illuminates the sky.
The town’s people seem not to notice.
They go about as normal.
The storm cries out.
The waters nearly flood the streets.
The thunder cracks it’s very loudest.
The winds begin to howl and screech,
Between buildings and down roads.
Still no one notices.
With their umbrellas and coats they shield themselves
From the rain.
Their chatter overpowers even the thunder.
The once mighty storm,
Whose winds now scream with pain
And whose rains fall like undried tears,
Bows it’s head
And gives in.
The clouds disappear beyond the horizon,
And the rain-dampened streets dry.
But the sun seems shine with a bit less luster,
And the dry wall is still stained from
Where streaks of rain once fell.
e.e. cummings
04 Feb 2010 Leave a Comment
in Uncategorized Tags: e.e. cummings, poem, poems, poetry
So I did some reasearch on what people thought of the poem I posted yesterday. I found one analysis of e.e. cumming’s poetry in general that I just love.
It was on lovepoems.yu-hu.com but listed no author:
“Cummings often wrote in very straightforward prosaic English, was sometimes playful or “vulgar” and sometimes created word-images that are difficult to “analyze” and easier to feel. More than most poets, he often seems to be striving for the ideal of the great craftsman: to make the difficult look simple, to give the reader the feeling of “oh, I could have written that.” On the other hand, anyone who tries to put syntactic meaning into some of his word-image poems will find themselves saying “huh??”
Because of the unconventional nature of Cummings’ poetry, the usual tools of literary criticism are not very useful. Perhaps for this reason, he was not taught in poetry courses for many years, and unlike T. S. Eliot and other more obscure and “erudite” contemporaries, was rarely to be found in “Serious” literary anthologies. He could not be made to fit into the conventional rubric. In any case, his morality, like the teachings of Socrates, would certainly corrupt the young. It is therefore interesting to see that today Cummings, the anti-classicist, is often regarded as a “classic” poet.”
Poem
03 Feb 2010 Leave a Comment
in Uncategorized Tags: e.e. cummings, love, poem, poems, poetry
I’ve been looking for this poem for so long. I read it once in high school and instantly fell in love. Then I could never remember the title. I thought It was called “One Plus One.” Anyway, after much googling I finally found it and thought I would share. What do you think??
If Everything Happens That Can’t Be Done
by: e.e. cummings
if everything happens that can’t be done
(and anything’s righter
than books
could plan)
the stupidest teacher will almost guess
(with a run
skip
around we go yes)
there’s nothing as something as one
one hasn’t a why or because or although
(and buds know better
than books
don’t grow)
one’s anything old being everything new
(with a what
which
around we come who)
one’s everyanything so
so world is a leaf so a tree is a bough
(and birds sing sweeter
than books
tell how)
so here is away and so your is a my
(with a down
up
around again fly)
forever was never till now
now i love you and you love me
(and books are shuter
than books
can be)
and deep in the high that does nothing but fall
(with a shout
each
around we go all)
there’s somebody calling who’s we
we’re anything brighter than even the sun
(we’re everything greater
than books
might mean)
we’re everyanything more than believe
(with a spin
leap
alive we’re alive)
we’re wonderful one times one
<3
