Focus

A fitting poem to have written in February.

Endurance 2/28/2011
Sometimes I watch the busy and
charging legs like windmills
as if the little plant
he carries means to kill
him but he doesn't stop to
set it down or takeabreath
feet like pistons hammer through
the dirt striking hard facing death
with life with
out fear.

I could be that six-legged ant:
footholds firm, winged in my career
across the pebbled weeks and days, plant
in hand with
out fear,
if I tried.


My first attempt at an acrostic poem, written during study hall, became very ironic:

Focus 1/1/2011
For ten seconds, if you could focus
On what you're doing
Could you
Use your time and not
Stop to write a useless, ugly poem.

Death Removes

Over the weekend, our 15 year old Labrador died. She was getting old so it wasn't altogether unexpected, but it was quite sad. Here are a couple poems about it. The title of the first one is an excerpt from a poem by Robert Frost called "Out, Out--" which has a similar, though importantly different theme. Also, we are reading E. E. Cummings in Literature class and I thought his style was fitting for the ideas of the second one. For those unfamiliar with this more visual style (as I am), it may look random, but every space and parenthesis does have one or more purposes. Some general guidelines to help with interpretation:
I use the letters "ed" as a symbol for death, not only as a final suffix but also as an ending that indicates the past tense, or finality.
In the first stanza, I describe how God first moved. In each stanza, watch for what it is that death removes.
Also, in each poem, "till" is used to refer to creation of life or potential for life (in terms of tilling the ground), in addition to its possible grammatical meaning of "until."

"since they were not the one dead--" 4/4/11
With what our dead dog
doesn't fill we hill
an island of dirt (untilled)
ringed by (soon not)dead grass.

And since winter
stings some unsprung ere spring
we walk whence we walked
and switch to
Black Sunday shoes
joining the living
singing spring.


e(n)d 4/4/11
In t he
(pre-beginning
was void un
moved) be
ginning God
moved, b(r)e
the(d)irt (un
moved)
till the dirt
moved.
th en(d e)
ath re
mov(e d)

Stand we
a
round the grave
a
million miles
a
part

(not) lifethoughts
of hikes and summers
shar ed
only shorthoughts
of liver worm squirms.

death
re mov ed.

Re-wind

Re-wind 3/30/2011
When all unwound my bobbin be
And every Fate should say "Enough."
When Clotho should turn weaving-weary,
And Atropos call her bluff,

When I am spent and all is done,
Then let the gift of Sunday's power,
That in the tomb unwound the Son,
So too unwind me in my hour,

And let my thread be wound anew
To fill the spools of those I knew.

Snowball

I wrote this poem about a month ago and debated for a while whether or not to post it. My Board of Poetry Approval (Rachel) liked it and thought it was time for a poem that was understandable without an explanation, so here it is. We recently read Gerard Manley Hopkins in Literature and I've made a few attempts to mirror his style with simple topics. Here's a taste of the beauty of Hopkins:

The Windhover
I caught this morning morning’s minion, king-
dom of daylight’s dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing,
As a skate’s heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding
Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird,—the achieve of, the mastery of the thing!

Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!

No wonder of it: sheer plod makes plough down sillion
Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion.

--

In this poem I was also trying to imitate that effect in movies where the camera will slow almost to a still frame, then fast forward for a second before going back to slow motion. I kind of feel bad posting this on the same page as Hopkins, but here you go.

Snowball 2/25/2011
arm
swings
curled fingers cast fast crushed flakes
white glow winged snow warms slow
while whirling white from curling flight, unfurling light as
it
flies
round, spurns snowground churns low, no sound
but just dusts the dirt with bits of almostbird
hits
white cloud. flight route, bright now
white ice flies twice: one hand, two lands,
stops.

One Plan

One Plan 3/21/2011

The world spins
some more in its universal moon-trailed career
and all around, oblivious, the stars and moons
and constellations do silent battle in the clear
and bitter war of gods as big as spoons
(little and big), the might of man instills no fear
or awe when met with worlds the shape and size of doom.

The world spins
and moves a man a million miles more than he had
feet to carry him, rusty-knuckled kneeling down
in dirt as heavy as his heavy head (no crown)
wrapped in the planet's dusty arms, weak as a lad's.

The world spins,
wearing weary circles in no(every)thing
like itself, round and round,
all one making,
but blind to the circle itself, until the
One (re)makes all.

And on the world spins.

Haiti

I just got back from an incredible trip to Haiti with some of my family and youth group where we connected with a friend of ours who is a long-term missionary there. We organized a Bible camp for the kids and painted the mission house where we stayed. A group of nurses for New York came down at the same time as us and set up a clinic for the Haitian children. Overall, it was an incredible time seeing children I hadn't seen since I was there nearly three years, growing in my faith, and bonding with my youth group. I made several attempts to capture the experience in poetry, all of which failed. These are two that came closest.


To a Haitian Child 3/15/2011
If I had the world
would I give it to your heart
that loves your family more that gold
and country more than birth?

If I had the world
would I put it in your hands
that know that feel of want and dirt
better far than frigid, metal coins?

If I had the world
would I teach it to your mind
that you might think that
lies come easier than death?

If I had the world
would I give it to your belly
groaning for stones no longer stones
and bread no longer bread?

If I had the world
would I give it to you?
And
I have the world
to you.


Reflections on My Trip To Haiti 3/17/2011
They tell you not to drink the water.
It might affect you.
It might get down in your veins,
make you sick with a fever,
take your breath away.

So I drank from a bottle of water clean as home.

I drank from a bottle as I ran
with barefoot children
playing soccer.

I drank from a bottle as I asked
the name of every child
begging in the streets.

I drank from a bottle as I talked
with Mackensie caring for orphaned siblings and
going to school.

I drank from a bottle as I looked
at the boy with white lumps on his head
smiling from the street.

I drank from a bottle as I played
Simon Says with thirty dirty children
bouncing in glee.

If you go to Haiti, drink the water.
It might affect you.
It might get down in your heart,
make you sick with compassion,
take your breath away.

I've been busy

Why I Haven't Posted Recently 2/14/2011
The feeling when you step, then
trip, tip and topple, tilting
forward flinging feet
forward falcon-fast
er forward
just to
keep from
falling
flat
(on the floor.)