I realized that blogger is not as aweseome and user-friendly as wordpress, which seems to be a much better blogging tool. Sorry to be wishy-washy, but I'm moving this blog to this site:
openfloodgates.wordpress.com
Wednesday, 12 May 2010
Friday, 7 May 2010
Exchange
I slowly count change at the register
like a child sent to the grocery store.
What is this one worth?
The woman does not smile
her hand is out and she sighs.
I crack jokes, encourage friendship
with people I'll never see again.
Where is the bathroom?
Where do I pay? What is this called?
Did I get it right?
Yesterday I put a lamp on my bedside
to dim the florescence.
I opened my package of bedding,
my packages of important papers.
Doors stay closed, the walls blank beige.
Gray days and misspellings,
countless faux pas.
I try to level. This is not what I
am used to. My daydreams,
real dreams, excluded this.
My unfamiliarity is losing luster.
But hidden beneath mossy bricks,
decaying leaves: hiding places
of ancient snails. And walking
through city blocks: castles.
I stop, mouth open and arms dropped.
Older than anything I've seen.
The same as things I've dreamed.
like a child sent to the grocery store.
What is this one worth?
The woman does not smile
her hand is out and she sighs.
I crack jokes, encourage friendship
with people I'll never see again.
Where is the bathroom?
Where do I pay? What is this called?
Did I get it right?
Yesterday I put a lamp on my bedside
to dim the florescence.
I opened my package of bedding,
my packages of important papers.
Doors stay closed, the walls blank beige.
Gray days and misspellings,
countless faux pas.
I try to level. This is not what I
am used to. My daydreams,
real dreams, excluded this.
My unfamiliarity is losing luster.
But hidden beneath mossy bricks,
decaying leaves: hiding places
of ancient snails. And walking
through city blocks: castles.
I stop, mouth open and arms dropped.
Older than anything I've seen.
The same as things I've dreamed.
Thursday, 6 May 2010
First Poem: Swansea
Golden-gray haze off cliffs to bays,
houses line the hillside, rows
of jagged teeth, the sea's jaws.
I at its tide tongue, grasping shells
with smooth, pink insides,
their barnacled heart-walls
swirling, rising, closing in and
half buried in the sand just
as my feet sink, but lifted leave
no holes. All tracks washed by waves
or lost in wavy words.
Rip-tide devastated ideas
are bits of floating styrofoam.
houses line the hillside, rows
of jagged teeth, the sea's jaws.
I at its tide tongue, grasping shells
with smooth, pink insides,
their barnacled heart-walls
swirling, rising, closing in and
half buried in the sand just
as my feet sink, but lifted leave
no holes. All tracks washed by waves
or lost in wavy words.
Rip-tide devastated ideas
are bits of floating styrofoam.
opening some floodgates.
On a warm night last summer, I sat with friends on the back porch, taking swigs out of a bottle of wine. We went around in a circle, sharing a personal goal each. Mine was to publish poetry, and it was agreed that the only way to do it was to push aside inhibitions and open the floodgates. This is an attempt to do so. I'm hoping that this, accompanied by as many submission forms that I can find and a lot of free writing, will get me on my way. My worries make me ask that when you read this, you judge not me but the writing.
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