The Sonnet Project

"Sonnet XI" by Pablo Neruda

2011-07-01T10:55:00.001-05:00

I crave your mouth, your voice, your hair.
Silent and starving, I prowl through the streets.
Bread does not nourish me, dawn disrupts me, all day
I hunt for the liquid measure of your steps.

I hunger for your sleek laugh,
your hands the color of a savage harvest,
hunger for the pale stones of your fingernails,
I want to eat your skin like a whole almond.

I want to eat the sunbeam flaring in your lovely body,
the sovereign nose of your arrogant face,
I want to eat the fleeting shade of your lashes,

and I pace around hungry, sniffing the twilight,
hunting for you, for your hot heart,
like a puma in the barrens of Quitratue.

--Pablo Neruda

Where Have You Gone?

2011-05-23T11:08:00.000-05:00

(This is one I wrote some time ago, but didn't post, for whatever reason. I found it in a notebook and thought I should put it up here before I lose it, as I don't think it's *entirely* terrible.)

Where have you gone? I've searched and searched for years
with no result. An obsolete e-mail,
an out-of-date address; the track gone stale
and no new clues. Still, no one disappears--

The world's not half as big now as it was
when Fate threw us together that first night
and we our bodies; touch and taste and sight
remain as sensual memory always does.

On college websites, Facebook--lost, I try
to find you, in my dotage looking back
to where the ghost of you burns like a flame;
I still can feel your heat, and hear your cry
of pleasure--then your form dissolves to black
and leaves me in the dark, Googling your name.

--SS

Berta

2011-03-15T10:29:00.000-05:00

You always kept some water by the bed
in case you woke up thirsty in the night.
I still remember that—and how the light
cut fault-lines through the glass. And once you said
you felt just like the white stray cat you fed
with scraps on paper plates you left outside.
When she stopped coming round, Lord, how you cried—
the water down your face, eyes puffed and red.

I think sometimes about the night you tried
to make me say I loved you—how the bright
blue tears stood in your eyes, where gold light bled
its heart-breaking refraction; how the sight
drew out my ugly truth; and how instead,
now knowing what I owe—I should have lied.

--SS

Happy birthday, Berta, wherever you are.

-----------------------------------
Original version on The Sonnet Project, December 29, 2006 (link)
Published at The Hypertexts, November 2008 (link)

"XVIII. Oh, when I was in love with you..." by A. E. Housman

2010-12-15T14:18:00.000-06:00

OH, when I was in love with you,
Then I was clean and brave,
And miles around the wonder grew
How well did I behave.

And now the fancy passes by,
And nothing will remain,
And miles around they ’ll say that I
Am quite myself again.

--A. E. Housman

"Another Dark Lady" by Edward Arlington Robinson

2010-09-24T08:00:00.000-05:00

Think not, because I wonder where you fled,
That I would lift a pin to see you there;
You may, for me, be prowling anywhere,
So long as you show not your little head:
No dark and evil story of the dead
Would leave you less pernicious or less fair --
Not even Lilith, with her famous hair;
And Lilith was the devil, I have read.
I cannot hate you, for I loved you then.
The woods were golden then. There was a road
Through beeches; and I said their smooth feet showed
Like yours. Truth must have heard me from afar,
For I shall never have to learn again
That yours are cloven as no beech's are.

--Edward Arlington Robinson

"Acquainted with the Night" by Robert Frost

2010-09-21T08:00:00.001-05:00

I have been one acquainted with the night.
I have walked out in rain -- and back in rain.
I have outwalked the furthest city light.

I have looked down the saddest city lane.
I have passed by the watchman on his beat
And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.

I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet
When far away an interrupted cry
Came over houses from another street,

But not to call me back or say good-bye;
And further still at an unearthly height,
O luminary clock against the sky

Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right.
I have been one acquainted with the night.

--Robert Frost

"I Have Longed to Move Away" by Dylan Thomas

2010-09-17T08:00:00.000-05:00

I have longed to move away
From the hissing of the spent lie
And the old terrors' continual cry
Growing more terrible as the day
Goes over the hill into the deep sea;
I have longed to move away
From the repetition of salutes,
For there are ghosts in the air
And ghostly echoes on paper,
And the thunder of calls and notes.

I have longed to move away but am afraid;
Some life, yet unspent, might explode
Out of the old lie burning on the ground,
And, crackling into the air, leave me half-blind.
Neither by night's ancient fear,
The parting of hat from hair,
Pursed lips at the receiver,
Shall I fall to death's feather.
By these I would not care to die,
Half convention and half lie.

--Dylan Thomas

"The Frankenstein Poet" by Billy Collins

2010-09-14T08:12:00.003-05:00

Pursued by the mob of townspeople
and the shaky glow of their torches,
he finds refuge crouching under a mossy bridge.

He takes a notepad from his huge jacket
and feels inspiration arriving
like a forking of electricity.

He fingers one of the wooden pegs
the doctor tapped into his temples,
little handlebars of the imagination now,

and his pencil moves in the darkness
to a jostling of vocabulary.

He is starting to write an elegy
for all the people whose bodies
are now parts of his body.
It opens with the eyes.

--Billy Collins

"Siren's Song" by Margaret Atwood

2010-09-10T08:00:00.000-05:00

This is the song everyone
would like to learn: the song
that is irresistible:

the song that forces men
to leap overboard in squadrons
even though they see the beached skulls

the song nobody knows
because anyone who has heard it
is dead, and the others can't remember.

Shall I tell you the secret
and if I do, will you get me
out of this bird suit?

I don't enjoy it here
squatting on this island
looking picturesque and mythical

with these two feathery maniacs,
I don't enjoy singing
this trio, fatal and valuable.

I will tell the secret to you,
to you, only to you.
Come closer. This song

is a cry for help: Help me!
Only you, only you can,
you are unique

at last. Also
it is a boring song
but it works every time.

--Margaret Atwood

"Ethics" by Linda Pastan

2010-09-07T11:49:00.002-05:00

In ethics class so many years ago
our teacher asked this question every fall:
if there were a fire in a museum
which would you save, a Rembrandt painting
or an old woman who hadn’t many
years left anyhow? Restless on hard chairs
caring little for pictures or old age
we’d opt one year for life, the next for art
and always half-heartedly. Sometimes
the woman borrowed my grandmother’s face
leaving her usual kitchen to wander
some drafty, half-imagined museum.
One year, feeling clever, I replied
why not let the woman decide herself?
Linda, the teacher would report, eschews
the burdens of responsibility.
This fall in a real museum I stand
before a real Rembrandt, old woman,
or nearly so, myself. The colors
within this frame are darker than autumn,
darker even than winter—the browns of earth,
though earth’s most radiant elements burn
through the canvas. I know now that woman
and painting and season are almost one
and all beyond saving by children.

--Linda Pastan

"Underground" by Seamus Heaney

2010-09-03T09:28:00.000-05:00

There we were in the vaulted tunnel running,
You in your going-away coat speeding ahead
And me, me then like a fleet god gaining
Upon you before you turned to a reed

Or some new white flower japped with crimson
As the coat flapped wild and button after button
Sprang off and fell in a trail
Between the Underground and the Albert Hall.

Honeymooning, moonlighting, late for the Proms,
Our echoes die in that corridor and now
I come as Hansel came on the moonlit stones
Retracing the path back, lifting the buttons

To end up in a draughty lamplit station
After the trains have gone, the wet track
Bared and tensed as I am, all attention
For your step following and damned if I look back.

--Seamus Heaney

"I Have Not Loved the World" by Lord Byron

2010-08-31T08:27:00.000-05:00

(from Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, stanzas 113-114)

I have not loved the world, nor the world me;
I have not flatter'd its rank breath, nor bow'd
To its idolatries a patient knee, --
Nor coin'd my cheek to smiles, -- nor cried aloud
In worship of an echo; in the crowd
They could not deem me one of such; I stood
Among them, but not of them; in a shroud
Of thoughts which were not their thoughts, and still could,
Had I not filed my mind, which thus itself subdued.

I have not loved the world, nor the world me, --
But let us part fair foes; I do believe,
Though I have found them not, that there may be
Words which are things, -- hopes which will not deceive,
And virtues which are merciful, nor weave
Snares for the failing: I would also deem
O'er others' griefs that some sincerely grieve;
That two, or one, are almost what they seem, --
That goodness is no name, and happiness no dream.

--George Gordon, Lord Byron

"The God Who Loves You" by Carl Dennis

2010-08-27T14:29:00.000-05:00

It must be troubling for the god who loves you
To ponder how much happier you’d be today
Had you been able to glimpse your many futures.
It must be painful for him to watch you on Friday evenings
Driving home from the office, content with your week—
Three fine houses sold to deserving families—
Knowing as he does exactly what would have happened
Had you gone to your second choice for college,
Knowing the roommate you’d have been allotted
Whose ardent opinions on painting and music
Would have kindled in you a lifelong passion.
A life thirty points above the life you’re living
On any scale of satisfaction. And every point
A thorn in the side of the god who loves you.
You don’t want that, a large-souled man like you
Who tries to withhold from your wife the day’s disappointments
So she can save her empathy for the children.
And would you want this god to compare your wife
With the woman you were destined to meet on the other campus?
It hurts you to think of him ranking the conversation
You’d have enjoyed over there higher in insight
Than the conversation you’re used to.
And think how this loving god would feel
Knowing that the man next in line for your wife
Would have pleased her more than you ever will
Even on your best days, when you really try.
Can you sleep at night believing a god like that
Is pacing his cloudy bedroom, harassed by alternatives
You’re spared by ignorance? The difference between what is
And what could have been will remain alive for him
Even after you cease existing, after you catch a chill
Running out in the snow for the morning paper,
Losing eleven years that the god who loves you
Will feel compelled to imagine scene by scene
Unless you come to the rescue by imagining him
No wiser than you are, no god at all, only a friend
No closer than the actual friend you made at college,
The one you haven’t written in months. Sit down tonight
And write him about the life you can talk about
With a claim to authority, the life you’ve witnessed,
Which for all you know is the life you’ve chosen.

--Carl Dennis

"Ave Maria" by Frank O'Hara

2010-08-24T09:16:00.001-05:00

Mothers of America
           let your kids go to the movies
get them out of the house so they won't
know what you're up to
it's true that fresh air is good for the body
          but what about the soul
that grows in darkness, embossed by
silvery images
and when you grow old as grow old you
must
          they won't hate you
they won't criticize you they won't know
          they'll be in some glamorous
            country
they first saw on a Saturday afternoon or
playing hookey
they may even be grateful to you
          for their first sexual experience
which only cost you a quarter
          and didn't upset the peaceful
            home
they will know where candy bars come
from
          and gratuitous bags of popcorn
as gratuitous as leaving the movie before
it's over
with a pleasant stranger whose apartment
is in the Heaven on
          Earth Bldg
near the Williamsburg Bridge
          oh mothers you will have made
              the little
                         tykes
so happy because if nobody does pick
them up in the movies
they won't know the difference
          and if somebody does it'll be
              sheer gravy
and they'll have been truly entertained
either way
instead of hanging around the yard
          or up in their room hating you
prematurely since you won't have done
anything horribly mean
               yet
except keeping them from life's darker joys
          it's unforgivable the latter
so don't blame me if you won't take this
advice
          and the family breaks up
and your children grow old and blind in
front of a TV set
          seeing
movies you wouldn't let them see when
they were young

--Frank O'Hara

Note: column width limitations prevent me from showing what is probably the poet's preferred version with white space intact. To read the poem in that format, click here for "Ave Maria" at FrankOHara.org.

"Searching" by Billy Collins

2010-08-20T08:10:00.000-05:00

I recall someone once admitting
that all he remembered of Anna Karenina
was something about a picnic basket,

and now, after consuming a book
devoted to the subject of Barcelona—
its people, its history, its complex architecture—

all I remember is the mention
of an albino gorilla, the inhabitant of a park
where the Citadel of the Bourbons once stood.

The sheer paleness of him looms over
all the notable names and dates
as the evening strollers stop before him

and point to show their children.
These locals called him Snowflake,
and here he has been mentioned again in print

in the hope of keeping his pallid flame alive
and helping him, despite his name, to endure
in this poem, where he has found another cage.

Oh, Snowflake,
I had no interest in the capital of Catalonia—
its people, its history, its complex architecture—

no, you were the reason
I kept my light on late into the night,
turning all those pages, searching for you everywhere.

--Billy Collins

"The Stairway" by Stephen Dunn

2010-08-17T08:13:00.000-05:00

The architect wanted to build a stairway
and suspend it with silver, almost invisible
guy wires in a high-ceilinged room,
a stairway you couldn't ascend or descend
except in your dreams. But first--
because wild things are not easily seen
if what's around them is wild--
he'd make sure the house that housed it
was practical, built two-by-four by
two-by-four, slat by slat, without ornament.
The stairway would be an invitation
to anyone who felt invited by it,
and depending on your reaction he'd know
if friendship were possible.
The house he'd claim as his, but the stairway
would be designed to be ownerless,
tilted against any suggestion of a theology,
disappointing to those looking for politics.
Of course the architect knew
that over the years he'd have to build
other things the way others desired,
knew that to live in this world was to trade
a few industrious hours for one beautiful one.
Yet every night when he got home
he could imagine, as he walked in the door,
his stairway going nowhere, not for sale,
and maybe some you to whom nothing
about it need be explained, waiting,
the wine decanted, the night about to unfold.

--Stephen Dunn

"Insomniac" by Sylvia Plath

2010-08-13T15:57:00.000-05:00

The night is only a sort of carbon paper,
Blueblack, with the much-poked periods of stars
Letting in the light, peephole after peephole ---
A bonewhite light, like death, behind all things.
Under the eyes of the stars and the moon's rictus
He suffers his desert pillow, sleeplessness
Stretching its fine, irritating sand in all directions.

Over and over the old, granular movie
Exposes embarrassments--the mizzling days
Of childhood and adolescence, sticky with dreams,
Parental faces on tall stalks, alternately stern and tearful,
A garden of buggy rose that made him cry.
His forehead is bumpy as a sack of rocks.
Memories jostle each other for face-room like obsolete film stars.

He is immune to pills: red, purple, blue ---
How they lit the tedium of the protracted evening!
Those sugary planets whose influence won for him
A life baptized in no-life for a while,
And the sweet, drugged waking of a forgetful baby.
Now the pills are worn-out and silly, like classical gods.
Their poppy-sleepy colors do him no good.>

His head is a little interior of grey mirrors.
Each gesture flees immediately down an alley
Of diminishing perspectives, and its significance
Drains like water out the hole at the far end.
He lives without privacy in a lidless room,
The bald slots of his eyes stiffened wide-open
On the incessant heat-lightning flicker of situations.

Nightlong, in the granite yard, invisible cats
Have been howling like women, or damaged instruments.
Already he can feel daylight, his white disease,
Creeping up with her hatful of trivial repetitions.
The city is a map of cheerful twitters now,
And everywhere people, eyes mica-silver and blank,
Are riding to work in rows, as if recently brainwashed.

--Sylvia Plath

"Charles on Fire" by James Merrill

2010-08-10T08:32:00.000-05:00

Another evening we sprawled about discussing
Appearances. And it was the consensus
That while uncommon physical good looks
Continued to launch one, as before, in life
(Among its vaporous eddies and false claims),
Still, as one of us said into his beard,
"Without your intellectual and spiritual
Values, man, you are sunk." No one but squared
The shoulders of their own unlovliness.
Long-suffering Charles, having cooked and served the meal,
Now brought out little tumblers finely etched
He filled with amber liquor and then passed.
"Say," said the same young man, "in Paris, France,
They do it this way"--bounding to his feet
And touching a lit match to our host's full glass.
A blue flame, gentle, beautiful, came, went
Above the surface. In a hush that fell
We heard the vessel crack. The contents drained
As who should step down from a crystal coach.
Steward of spirits, Charles's glistening hand
All at once gloved itself in eeriness.
The moment passed. He made two quick sweeps and
Was flesh again. "It couldn't matter less,"
He said, but with a shocked, unconscious glance
Into the mirror. Finding nothing changed,
He filled a fresh glass and sank down among us.

--James Merrill

"A Bigfoot Poem" by Dave Bonta

2010-08-06T08:53:00.000-05:00

would have nothing whatsoever
to do with, you know — those interlopers.
It would have, I suppose,
a cold mountain stream in it,
a rock shifting in the current,
the too-loud splash of a trout.
It would have loose bark
ticking in the wind
& a saw-whet owl’s discrete
requests for clarification —
that kind of persistence.
It would have the hush
when the crickets suddenly stop
& your pulse makes such a racket
you’re sure it will give you away,
you whose knees
are incapable of bending,
whose feet grip as much of the ground
as they can still lay claim to.
It would cry, that poem,
possibly for joy.
It would hiss.

--Dave Bonta

"Dracula's Housecat" by Anna George Meek

2010-08-03T10:18:00.000-05:00

More lithe I am, and living,
than he who also hunts by night.
We whisper the fields where titmice quiver;
we sip black water from the kills.
I leap the grass blades, the air unsheathed,
moon the shape of my eye. He's quick
for a little bat, but I feast first:
mortality coils in my haunches.
I eat and bare my belly in bloodroot
to tease the lean eagles who desire me.
And still, the bat is suckling his corpse.
I would rip off his wings and roll his soul
immortally between my paws,
but he alone lets me in before dawn
to climb the castle drapes. Later,
I rapture in sunlight while he sleeps
in his box—which I have only once
misused. I love my warm body thrumming.
I love my delicious short life.

—Anna George Meek

"After Love" by Maxine Kumin

2010-07-29T11:59:00.000-05:00

Afterward, the compromise.
Bodies resume their boundaries.

These legs, for instance, mine.
Your arms take you back in.

Spoons of our fingers, lips
admit their ownership.

The bedding yawns, a door
blows aimlessly ajar

and overhead, a plane
singsongs coming down.

Nothing is changed, except
there was a moment when

the wolf, the mongering wolf
who stands outside the self

lay lightly down, and slept.

--Maxine Kumin

"Wild Orders" by Jack Butler

2010-07-27T08:21:00.000-05:00

Let me look on nothing like myself --
let me look on wild orders.
There are always wars at the borders,
there are always borders.

What keeps plant from animal but a name
hidden somewhere inside?
What keeps saint from murderer but a refusal
to accept the blame?

-- I came as close as any came.

O tongue of seeded flame,
O visitant of the rank and tattered petals,
let me be butterfly, or blank

as the heart of a star, heart of water:
come battering
the gates apart, lord hawk, lord frog, lord thing,
but teach me how to sing.

--Jack Butler

A great poem by one of my all-time favorite poets. Read more of Jack's work at The Hypertexts.

"I'm Really Very Fond" by Alice Walker

2010-07-23T12:27:00.000-05:00

I'm really very fond of you,
he said.

I don't like fond.
It sounds like something
you would tell a dog.

Give me love,
or nothing.

Throw your fond in a pond,
I said.

But what I felt for him
was also warm, frisky,
moist-mouthed,
eager,
and could swim away.

if forced to do so.

--Alice Walker

"A Man Saw a Ball of Gold" by Stephen Crane

2010-07-20T11:13:00.000-05:00

A man saw a ball of gold in the sky;
He climbed for it,
And eventually he achieved it --
It was clay.

Now this is the strange part:
When the man went to the earth
And looked again,
Lo, there was the ball of gold.
Now this is the strange part:
It was a ball of gold.
Aye, by the heavens, it was a ball of gold.

--Stephen Crane

Update, and Something New

2010-07-20T10:55:00.000-05:00

So the Sonnet Project is done, restarted, and done again, but I still can't seem to stay away from the place. I don't flatter myself that anyone is still checking in here at all, though a few might stumble across the monument to past achievements it's become thanks to web searches for "bad sonnets" or some other vagaries of the Google. But just in case anyone *did* happen to wonder: I'm alive, physically if not creatively. I haven't written much poetry in the last several months, despite my desire to do so. I toy periodically with the thought of starting the Project yet a third time, but haven't had the energy or impetus up to now. Maybe that will change.

But until such time as it does: because blogging abhors a vacuum, I thought I might do something new with this space to keep it from sitting here disused and depressing. Over time I have collected a large number of poems that I like a great deal by people other than me, both online and in anthologies. Since I do love poetry even when I'm not actively producing it, I thought I could use the blog to share these with any readers who might chance to wander by. I also like the idea of discussing these poems and Poetry in general with any interested readers, or even just life, philosophy, and everything.

So anyway, that's the idea. I'll be posting one or two of these poems a week, either until I start writing my own stuff again, or till I run out. If anybody finds them, I hope you enjoy, and please feel free to comment--I'd love to get discussions started with like-minded folks.

Free Verse

2010-06-03T15:19:00.000-05:00

In poetry, as in life,
I find it hard to work
without restrictions

And still be good.

-SS

#461: The Old Detective Waxes Philosophical Over a Pusher's Corpse, While His Young Partner Listens

2010-03-12T16:34:00.000-06:00

"There's two ways you can look at it," he said.
"First, maybe he was only passing through.
Got tangled in some drug deal, lost his head,
and wound up here. Old story. Nothing new.

"The second way is metaphysical,
involving destiny and fate, you see?
Some cosmic, strange gravitational pull
brought him to where he was supposed to be.

"And so his death is like a sacrifice
to gods we have forgotten. If not that,
chaos, to which no meaning can adhere.
So, one or two, son? Neither's very nice."
He lit a cigarette and grabbed his hat.
"Well, anyway, he's dead. Let's get a beer."

#460: Things to Do with Pencils Besides Writing Poems

2010-03-11T16:24:00.001-06:00

Beat out a rock song on your desktop set
(Your mug makes one great cymbal, FYI)
Or maybe see how many you can get
stuck in the ceiling tiles on your first try.

Unsharpened, use as chopsticks. (If the taste
of graphite doesn't bug you, sharpened too.)
Stir water into stubborn clumps of paste
and then create sculptures of wood and glue.

With rubber bands and paperclips, pretend
you and your friends are fearsome Indian braves.
See how many you can stack end-to-end.

Make tourniquets, or splint a broken bone;
or put them down and leave the things alone.

#459: Hail to the King

2010-03-10T14:58:00.000-06:00

I am the king of all that I survey,
my dominion as far as I can see!
(That's half the yard on an uncloudy day--
the house, my car, mailbox, a rock, that tree.)

I am a vicious warrior without peer
who's never known the sour taste of defeat!
(In fact, my reputation wields such fear
no one has even challenged me! That's neat.)

Fair damsels are unable to refuse
my charms (or would be, if I asked them out).
Conquer the gods? I could, should I so choose.
(I don't choose so, but that's no cause for doubt.)

I'm more handsome and strong and brave than most
(but no one knows, 'cause I don't like to boast).

#458: Mystery

2010-03-09T11:41:00.000-06:00

He did good work; he hardly ever spoke,
and when he did, he never wasted words.
Few friends, even among the IT nerds.
Three times a day he went outside to smoke.

But now and then he'd laugh--a short, sharp sound
as if some joke had caught him by surprise;
no explanation, no smile in his eyes,
and only when no one else was around.

Then one day he was gone--just didn't show
for work, with neither notice nor goodbye.
His coffee mug still on his desk, a ring
of keys there in the drawer. Beats anything.
At last the boss just shrugged and let it go.
I still don't know what happened to the guy.

#457: The Less Things Change

2010-03-08T23:00:00.000-06:00

I tend to think that life will stay the same:
how things are now, that's how they'll always be.
Experience can't teach the contrary,
despite its constant lessons. I can blame

a kind of sad inertia of the brain,
stubborn determination to believe
only the worst can last. I can't conceive
an upward curving graph, an end to rain.

And yet I know Spring comes. I know the sun
does dissipate the fog. It's nothing strange.
But something in me sees a cloud-filled sky,
a moonless night, a treasured plan undone
and thinks it permanent. I don't know why.
The world is wet. The weather will not change.

#456: End of Day

2010-03-07T21:10:00.000-06:00

A quiet hour at last: the ice cubes sing
like chimes, and I can sit back and relax
at last. The daily burden of our facts
and figures melt away, and everything
casts off its weight. There's nothing left to do
but reconsider calmly what has passed;
the tally of our breaths and heartbeats. Last
to go, now that the sky has gone from blue
to pinholed black, is this: what have I done
today (of all days) that might, in a year,
a month, a day, still be remembered? What
will stay for one more cycle of the sun?
The gin dilutes, the tonic stays as clear
as always. What was my point? I forgot.

#455: There Was a Time, My Love, When We Could Sit

2010-03-06T23:49:00.000-06:00

There was a time, my love, when we could sit,
hold hands, and stare into each others' eyes
for hungry hours, and not get bored of it.
Young love has just such power to hypnotize.

In former days we'd only kiss, until,
our curfews near, we pulled away and sighed--
Our hot desire fed, though unfulfilled;
our lusts inflamed, but strangely satisfied.

But now experience has taught us greed,
and what sufficed once will no longer do;
thus fantasy has transformed into need,
and blasted what contentment we once knew.

A touch, a glance, a breath, a sigh, a kiss;
A shame we hunger now for more than this.

#454: Prologue to Attack of the Megafish

2010-03-05T14:56:00.000-06:00

(an unfilmed scifi/horror movie existing entirely in the poet's mind)

The doctor pushed his glasses up his nose
and stared in wonder at his petri dish.
He never thought the genome grafts on fish
would ever work this well. Not even close.

He shot the stuff into a minnow's brain
and sent his intern, Fritz, down to the pond
to set it free. His mind soared, well beyond
all ethical concerns. He would explain

himself to history, shaking his fist
at research fellows--backwards, fearful lot!
The fools! He'd show them who was on the fringe!
Perhaps soon something monstrous would exist
that never had, and, most would say, should not...
He sat back, smiling, dreaming of revenge.

#453: Giallo

2010-03-04T15:35:00.000-06:00

"Giallo" films are characterized by extended murder sequences featuring excessive bloodletting, stylish camerawork and unusual musical arrangements. The literary whodunit element is retained, but combined with modern slasher horror, while being filtered through Italy's longstanding tradition of opera and staged grand guignol drama.--Wikipedia

Tonight get out the J&B, and don
black leather gloves. Dust off that wide-brimmed hat.
Razor: in pocket. Huge sunglasses? ON.
And don't forget your metaphoric cat.

Pack dragonflies, a broken doll, but not
a handgun--that's too amateur by half.
Don't shoot; don't torture ducklings; don't get caught.
Stay shadow-bound, and let the windows laugh.

At midnight, when the real and dream worlds mesh
She'll come to meet her lover in the glade.
(She ought to learn not to go near the park.)
You know that somewhere in her folds of flesh
the secret lies, so free it with your blade;
She'll show you all the colors of the dark.

#452: Zippadee Doo-dah

2010-03-03T16:21:00.000-06:00

Alarm goes off; even a string quartet
rattles like heavy metal round my skull--
too early yet to savor how the pull
of horsehair bows on catgut sings. I'll get

the covers off, although they cling to me
like some man-eating blob from outer space.
Robe on, I'll splash some water on my face
and lurch downstairs, my only thought: "Coffeeee...."

When Phoebus slaps his flaming stallions' flanks
and draws his chariot over the line
to start his chase, some doubtless think that's fine;
but I'm a bit more stingy with my thanks.

"The Sun will rise." Well, you know what I say:
it's sure a rotten way to start the day.

#451: Leaving the Castle

2010-03-02T13:08:00.000-06:00

Let cobwebs gather in the corners; let
the dust fall from the chandeliers like snow.
Let those who knew the path from here forget
and those who didn't, let them never know.

Let rafters creak unheard under the weight
of their own mass; let tiles fall where they may.
Let cellar bottles transubstantiate
their guts to vinegar. We cannot stay.

Let glamour go to squalor; let the vines
creep in between the windowpanes where glass
once held, but now lies shattered on the floor.
And if someday someone should see these signs
of habitation, let them sigh and pass
these rooms where we once lived, who live no more.

#450: Things I've Found in the Parking Lot at Work

2010-03-01T16:33:00.000-06:00

The bolt from some machine, about the size
of one finger. A plastic bubble shell,
the kind that holds a supermarket prize.
A dented, ornamental jingle bell.

An Uno card (Blue Zero). Paper clips.
A water bill, apparently unpaid.
A shiny chrome hub cap. Garish wax lips.
And once even a rusted razor blade.

A chintzy shamrock pin. After a rain,
some drowning earthworms twitching in the flow
of oil-slick puddles, whom I tried in vain
to rescue. One dark feather off a crow.

Pennies, of course, and dimes; both heads and tails.
Five screws, and maybe half a dozen nails.

Poetry News, At Last

2009-10-04T11:48:00.000-05:00

My free verse poem, "Haunt," has just been published in ChiZine, the online journal of horror fiction and poetry. You can read it by clicking the link below:

"Haunt" by Scott Standridge on ChiZine

The End, Again

2009-05-16T11:33:00.000-05:00

So yesterday, I didn't write a poem. I thought about it early in the day, figured I would do it later, and then it didn't occur to me again till this morning. So the streak has ended.

I take this as a sign. When I was doing the first Sonnet Year, it was always on my mind--I sometimes had to force myself, sometimes had to sweat it out, but I *never* just forgot about it. It was important to me.

I've enjoyed writing the sonnets again since I restarted a couple months back, but I'm just not feeling the importance of it anymore. I think it's time to do something else. Or just stop entirely.

Anyway, I"m proud of what I've done here, and should I write other occasional sonnets in the future--and let's be honest, I can't really see this *not* happening--I'll probably post them here.

Thanks to everyone who read, and the smaller number of those who cared.

SS

#449: Nightmare

2009-05-14T21:01:00.000-05:00

I lost the path somewhere along the way
and soon I found myself amid thick trees;
their creaking branches rattled in the breeze
like ancient, brittle bones. Their bark was gray.

Around me in the shadows, snarling beasts
beat down the underbrush with padded claws;
the dry twigs broke, a sound like snapping jaws
impatient for their nightly bloody feast.

And overhead the moon looked like a hole
stabbed through the satin stomach of the sky
and slowly bleeding out its entrail cloud.
I stood there, rooted, fearing for my soul,
and listened to the horned owl's deadly cry
as darkness closed around me like a shroud.

#448: The Green Revenger (Ret.) Remembers the Incident that Ended His Career

2009-05-13T20:43:00.000-05:00

When you've been wearing tights as long as me
you know just by the model of their boots
if it's a joy ride or a killing spree.
You read it in the bloodstains on their suits.

This guy--the long black gloves, that leather mask?
He really meant it. No role-playing games.
No banter--stayed relentlessly on-task.
He didn't bother coming up with names.

My sidekick at the time, Flag Wavin' Kid,
tried some big action-hero kind of kick.
He never knew what hit him, but I did.
I saw it, and it made me kind of sick.

He laughed--a chilling sound--and leapt the fence;
and worst of all: nobody's seen him since.

#447: Postcard on the Lam

2009-05-12T20:18:00.000-05:00

The sun was bleeding out across the sky
like somebody had knifed it. Squared-off tops
of buildings stood erect like traffic cops
waving a funeral on. I wondered why
you hadn't shown up yet--here three hours late
and Louie's big palms itching for the dough.
He asked us where you was; we didn't know.
I figured dead, or staring out the grate
in some big iron door without a key,
or at the pier, your feet in wet cement.
You should have seen the look on Louie's face
the day he got your card. Although it meant
another bloody job for Ox and me,
I figured that was worth a few days' grace.

#446: Untitled

2009-05-11T16:50:00.000-05:00

Sometimes I think I don't have what it takes
to be content; like something in my deep
dark heart that never rises from its sleep
dreams constantly of failures and mistakes
and future tragedies; gray thunderheads;
black puddles with a rainbow slick of oil;
the deep decaying scent of rich black soil
that never will be sown; unslept-in beds.

I've heard the tales of drowning men, near death,
who, kicking toward a world of air that seems
impossible to reach, feel sudden peace;
the way the sun's cold light dapples and gleams
must make their tortured souls accept release
exulting in the memory of breath.

#445: Ode to the Martini

2009-05-10T20:35:00.000-05:00

Martinis are my wonder drug of choice--
experience requires no further proof.
I feel sophisticated and aloof
and something smooths the edges of my voice
beyond that first sour sip. Like Cary Grant
I raise an eyebrow, light a cigarette
and instantly more than my lips are wet.
Each debutante becomes a sycophant
to my suave, worldly ways and derring-do.
There's something in it neither age nor youth
can quite explain--though its effects are sure.
And whether it's the gin or the vermouth,
or something psychological, it's true:
Whatever ails--martinis are the cure.

#444: A Story without a Moral

2009-05-09T20:53:00.000-05:00

So once upon a time there was this troll
who lived, like many did, beneath a bridge.
He earned his meager living taking toll
from tourists on their way to Witches' Ridge.

(The Ridge was an amusement park of sorts--
there were no witches really, just some crones
who put on shows for guests at their resorts
and sold them turkey legs and ice cream cones.)

The troll (whose name was Norbert) never got
to see the Ridge or ride the Broomstick Swing.
He took the travelers' money, cursed his lot,
and lusted for ice cream like anything.

One day they built a bypass round the town,
and both the toll bridge and the Ridge closed down.

#443: Considering My Cat Eli

2009-05-08T20:31:00.000-05:00

I live my life in service of a cat--
a cold, ungrateful, evil sort of beast.
And though my care keeps him healthy and fat,
he never deigns to thank me in the least.

I've let him keep his claws, and my reward
is watching him destroy my drapes and chairs.
He walks the house as if he were the lord
and I a vassal far beneath his cares.

Despite the food bowls I fill and refill
he never purrs beneath my gentle stroke,
He would not care for me should I fall ill,
and if I died, he'd eat me. What a joke.

I'd get no love if I had his dish pewtered.
I think next week I'm going to have him neutered.

#442: The Lucky Frog

2009-05-07T16:37:00.000-05:00

Come on: you must have kissed some frogs before
you got to me. It's only common sense.
How many? Dozens? Hundreds? Maybe more?
Not every maiden searching for her prince

gets lucky that first trip down to the bog.
Enchanted royalty don't come around
like beggars, forming lines on every log
with broad lips puckered, waiting to be found.

You must have sickened of the taste of slime
and failure long before you stretched your hand
to scoop me from my pad--Just one more time,
you thought. Don't worry love; I understand

the reason I now wear your golden crown.
I'll do my best to keep the croaking down.

#441: Don't Get Me Started

2009-05-06T20:33:00.000-05:00

Those motherfucking cocks! They don't know shit!
They act like someone gave them a degree
in Ignoramus Arts and Bastardy.
Too harsh? Bub, you don't know the half of it.

So high and mighty, putting on them airs--
much better than the likes of me and you!
That's what those asshats think. As if their poo
was fresh and sweet as roses! Ah, who cares?

Real guys, like us--the hearty, hale and sound
who work to make our pay--we know what's what.
Don't need to tell you which one is your butt
and which a goddamn crater in the ground!

But them? Those fucks? They couldn't find their asses
with flashlights, maps, and magnifying glasses.

#440: Sonnet to His Dark Mistress

2009-05-05T16:18:00.000-05:00

Oh Goddess of the Bean, your bitter taste
converts itself to sweetness in my blood!
Intemperate, I quaff you at a pace
less than I want, but greater than I should;

I let no cream nor sugar come between
my physiology and your dark heat;
My tall, black Dominatrix of Caffeine!
Each day I beg to suckle at your teat.

Without your curling steam, I'd walk the earth
in deep malaise, the listless living dead!
Nor will I suffer fools who doubt your worth
and down their tepid cups of tea instead;

So scald me! Stain my teeth and make me shake!
I'll crawl back to you, every coffee break.

#439: The Ancient Lover, to a Young Lady

2009-05-04T20:32:00.000-05:00

Some men might watch you flirt and say, "Too much!"
And so, to them, you are--that much is clear.
But I, a connoisseur of scent and touch?
Too much is not enough for me, my dear.

You're wild as Queen Diana in her wood,
whom Actaeon watched bathing silently.
He bought her naked glory with is blood.
Ah, such a price is far too cheap for me.

I've plucked the flowers of virgins by the score
and sniffed the sacred odalisque's delights;
my memories are flavored with their dew.
My hair is gray, but we have countless nights
before Sweet Lady Death, that final Whore,
drinks my last spunk. Till then, Love--it's for you.

#438: Tired

2009-05-03T19:50:00.000-05:00

I'm slow as cold molasses, slow as pans
of tepid water creeping toward a boil;
as languid as the shifting desert sands
and thick as thirty-thousand-mile oil.

I'm sleepy like a puppy when his hours
of romping through the meadowgrass is done;
like Dorothy and the lion in the flowers.
Like any kitten stretched out in the sun.

I'm worn like some old suit with frayed lapels,
beat down like doors of long-since conquered keeps;
depleted like a year-old battery's cells,
and slumberous now as any thing that sleeps.

The time has come to hit the sack, lie down
like crooked fighters, bound for Sleepy Town.

#437: Hidden Talent

2009-05-03T00:00:00.000-05:00

His tryout was disastrous, I recall.
He took the test like everyone, you know.
His fighting skills were zero, none at all;
His strength not super--average or below.

No water skills--he couldn't swim a stroke,
much less communicate with octopi.
His foot-speed was a kind of running joke,
forgive the pun. He couldn't even fly.

We broke the news as gently as we could:
"Thank you for coming in," that sort of stuff.
But told him, though we knew his heart was good,
The rest of him was not quite good enough.

He rose and thanked us, fighting back the tears,
then BANG! The modest bastard disappears!

#436: The Last Raid

2009-05-01T20:57:00.000-05:00

The pirates stood surrounded on the foredeck,
outnumbered twenty redcoats to a man.
And every buccaneer knew what a sore neck
awaited him before his feet touched land.

And so the Captain drew his Spanish saber,
his Mate the curved blade of the Saracen,
and, having set themselves this final labor,
sang out courageously to all the men:

"Ahoy there, Lads! For yonder sails a frigate,
Its gut as fat as any English lord's,
and rum to drink from mug and glass and spigot,
the finest on the seas--so Up your Swords!"

The soldiers turned, the muskets came about--
and two, or one, almost had time to shout.

#434: Grammar Lesson

2009-04-29T20:56:00.000-05:00

A noun? Well, that's a person, or a thing--
could be a place--like Dallas. Boston. Crete.
Your dog, who you don't feed. Your Uncle Pete.
Your Lego blocks; that kite without its string.

Crete? That's near Greece. The country, not the lard.
Though both are nouns. One's proper, one is not.
A kind of name, like Archibald, or Scott,
Or Shady Rest Resort. It's not that hard.

An adjective describes the noun, you see:
The messy room. The sassy little kid
Who gets no spankings like his father did
For smarting off the way you do to me...

I tell you, if you'd been my father's son--
Whazzat? Ah, never mind. Now, are we done?

#433: Communication Breakdown

2009-04-28T20:09:00.000-05:00

I called my mom to tell her all my news;
I only got the answering machine.
Then Pop--I had a phone card I could use;
I guess he rand down to the Dairy Queen.

I tried my cousin--Dad's half-brother's son--
it rang and rang and rang; nobody there.
How many college buddies answered? None.
I slammed my phone book, fighting off despair.

The Operator would not talk to me,
And Information's some recorded voice
Tried 9-1-1-; I cried "Emergency!"
The sole reply was that damned beeping noise.

But then you answered, love--my lucky day!
Too bad I hadn't anything to say.

#432: The Rabbit's Dream

2009-04-27T16:53:00.000-05:00

A bunny we'll call Moppettop once found
himself in some strange field; the grass was blue.
His floppy ears paddled a sea of sound
he'd never heard before. The flowers grew

on woody stalks three times their normal height.
They bloomed to platter-size, and smelled like rain.
He crouched there, motionless, until the night
came on in deep maroon. Almost insane

with dizziness and fear, at last he slept
and dreamed green meadows, red and golden flowers
that smelled the way they ought. When he awoke,
the magic of the intervening hours
had dissipated like magician's smoke.
Incurious, the rabbit looked, and leapt.

#431: Untitled

2009-04-26T14:36:00.001-05:00

Removed by request.

#430: Drinking Buddies

2009-04-25T22:00:00.000-05:00

We came out of the bar about as drunk
as we could get--unburdened, clumsy, broke,
and singing bawdy songs. We stank of smoke
and failure. In the street, a black cat slunk
away, afraid of all our boisterous noise.
He clattered down the alley with the cans
and moaned a hopeless music, like a man's
last cry before despair packs up his voice
in rough pine crates. My hat all bent to hell,
askew atop my wildly spinning brain,
I sang Oh Mary Jane, won't you be mine?
I've had my penecillin--then we fell
into each other's arms and laughed the pain
into our collars. I got home by nine.
_

#429: Last Laugh

2009-04-24T22:14:00.000-05:00

Nobody thought he'd take it quite so far.
He'd always been a prankster--leaving tacks
in teachers' chairs, those funny snap-gum packs,
the dummy leg you hang out of the car
to fake an accident. All fun and games.
But then his woman left him--couldn't take
not knowing whether things were real or fake
between them (honestly, nobody blames
the woman--how much plastic doggy-doo
and roaches could you stand?); but in his head
something went snap! They found him over there--
the buzzer in his hand, the metal chair
wired to the doorbell--smiling, sure, but dead.
Nobody saw it coming. Well, would you?
_

#428: Demento Mori

2009-04-23T16:43:00.000-05:00

I never did it in a cemetery,
and would not have succeeded had I tried;
my partners would have found it sick and scary,
or else preferred to make our love inside;

Those crypt tops don't make comfortable bedding;
they'd leave you all dissatisfied and sore,
however much you like the thought of wedding
your bodies over those that wed no more;

And so, my thoughts of carnal celebration
of life there in the palaces of death
cast off, I've had to do my copulation
in hotel rooms whose tenants still draw breath--

But sometimes I get randy when I see
a grave--it's the romantic soul in me.

#426: Old Friends

2009-04-21T21:07:00.000-05:00

I thought I'd need some poetry today
and so I pulled some favorites off the shelves:
Byron and Cummings--those speak for themselves.
The Brownings, Donne, and St. Vincent Millay;

I passed on Burns, preferring Heaney's brogue
to his; took Housman's regimental verse,
the holy joy of Hopkins, the perverse
delight of Lord Rochester, that old rogue.

Jack Butler, who can wrap his pain and mine
in smiles and mathematics, make them sing;
Marvell I took, Swinburne I left behind
with many others I'd have liked to bring.

"Next time," I promised, so to make amends,
then left, my arms weight down with old, dear friends.

#425: Dark Arts

2009-04-20T20:21:00.000-05:00

They did not like the art he made--they said
his lines were primitive, his colors weak.
They claimed he had no eye and less technique
and should have been a house painter instead.

For season after season he endured
their withering critiques; he only sighed
to hear his talent slandered and denied,
and never raised a hand nor said a word.

They could not understand his genius yet.
They could not know what higher muse he served.
It would be years before they understood.
Then--when they saw his masterpiece, still wet
with all his critics' entrails, bile and blood--
he'd get the recognition he deserved.
_

Pub or Perish 2009: Sonnet Boy Reads Again

2009-04-19T19:55:00.000-05:00

Last night I read at the Arkansas Times' annual Pub or Perish reading, held this year at Sticky Fingerz in downtown Little Rock. It was a great time, and my poetry seemed to go over well. Dorothy Allison, author of the 1993 National Book Award finalist Bastard Out of Carolina and the featured reader of the night, made a point of telling my my sonnets were "wonderful." So that was nice. :)

But why take Dorothy's and my word for it? Pushing the Sonnet Project into multimedia territory, I am pleased to offer free for download my complete reading from Pub or Perish 2009 in mp3 format, via RapidShare.com.

Just click on the link, select "free user" (unless you happen to have a Rapidshare Premium account), and wait until the link appears, usually less than a minute. It's about 10 MB big.

Also, I tried to record the kind intro David Koon of the Arkansas Times gave me, but my VR didn't pick it up very well. Once I start reading though, it comes through all right.

And let me know what you think!

CLICK HERE to download Scott's reading from Pub or Perish 2009!

#424: My Love, How I Have Failed You

2009-04-19T19:49:00.000-05:00

My love, how I have failed you. I have yet
to book that flight to Rome, to take your hand
and lead you to the Trevi, Neptune's band
of demigod attendants soaking wet
with faux seaspray. I have not yet arranged
that long-promised Lake Country holiday,
those fields of daffodils where poets play;
nor London, Paris, Venice. I'm unchanged
in my intentions, dear, though how I ought
to make my words come true, I cannot tell.
Back then we lived on romance, without kids
or mortgages or day jobs. Just as well,
or else we'd not have promised what we did.

But one of these days, Love, I'll get you there.
You married me--after all, fair is fair.

#423: Truffles and Bones

2009-04-18T14:05:00.000-05:00

So once upon a time there was this dog--
a little guy, with hair all in his eyes.
His best friend was this truffle snuffling hog,
whose talent made him every Frenchman's prize.

They went into the woods one day alone
(their owner sleeping off too much red wine);
the dog in quest of some long-buried bone,
the hog for fungus much more rare and fine.

Then suddenly the dog began to dig
and pulled up truffles, truffles by the pound!
"This is easy!" he called out to the pig.
"I'm finding more than you have ever found!"

"Should I start seeking bones?" the pig then said,
and bared his tusks. The dog just shook his head.
_

#422: La Noche del Hombre-Lobo

2009-04-17T20:52:00.000-05:00

They had him in his grave, or so they thought--
but now he stalks the moors and knows no rest.
The Gypsies, damn them--dirty, thieving lot!
have pulled the Silver Cross out of his chest.

Daninksy Castle's windows are ablaze
with torchlight; then at night, those horrid screams
that turn to howls. The moon's cold, deadly rays
bring down a curse that only Death redeems,

and that at True Love's hand, so says the lore.
The ancient legends teach no other way.
Look there, where on black velvet Luna hangs!
Tonight the Polish hills run red with blood,
and no virgin is safe from his dread fangs.
He's not that pure at heart. He does not pray.
_

#421: Invisible Perv in a Girl's Dormitory

2009-04-16T20:46:00.000-05:00

We've spread the flour in front of every door,
so check for footprints first, then go inside.
The curtains twitch--don't hang around for more:
get out of there and find someplace to hide.

And now, about the toilets--he's been known
to crouch there, pantsless, motionless for hours,
and some girls say, erect. Don't go alone.
Be sure before you sit. Avoid the showers.

But should the worst occur--you find yourself
pinned down, an unseen tongue tracing your throat
and hands under your boobs, kick out and yell!
There's tinted pepper spray on every shelf
in every room. Find yours, and make a note.
Invisible or not, we'll give him hell.
_

#420: Artists' Model, at His Local Bar

2009-04-15T20:35:00.000-05:00

Each Wednesday night the university
art teacher calls me up to have me pose.
Say what? Professor? Yeah, she's one of those.
Her students sure ain't seen the likes of me
in any of their textbooks! It's the burns.
She says the texture--ridges, pits, and whorls--
are good for shading practice. All the girls
stare hard; I don't mind that! The platform turns
so everyone can get a look.
                           The boys
try not to check my dick, but always do.
I wink and tell 'em I've had no complaints.
"A ribbed one's something every broad enjoys!"
I whip it out. Sometimes one of 'em faints.
Ten bucks and hour for that!

                             She's pretty, too.

#418: Worst Case Scenario

2009-04-13T16:45:00.000-05:00

The skateboard waiting by the bottom stair:
concussion. Broken ankle. ER trip.
Deep tissue bruise. Brain damage. Just one slip,
and Tragedy can catch you unaware.

The bike ride down the driveway: not so bad;
but then, a speeding car. You draw your breath
to warn him--screeching tires and certain death.
And all your fault. You should have been there, Dad.

But worse than this: you make that one wrong choice
or say some angry words you can't take back.
Then years down the line: the blood-red hate
shot through his eyes, the venom in his voice,
his childish memories all edged in black--
and you, speechless and old, grown wise too late.
_

#417: Not Looking for Answers

2009-04-12T21:19:00.001-05:00

What? Set 'em up again? Yeah, might as well.
It's not like anybody's keeping score
or waiting up at home, so what the hell!
What was my last, a whiskey? So--one more;

At least the one--we'll see what happens next,
then judge what course of action suits us best.
If cured, we'll say good night, but if still vexed
by life or love or--well, you know the rest.

It's clear the riddle's answer that we seek
will not be found in bottles, vats, or cans;
we are not fools. We have not come for such.
For now, we're done with mysteries that leak
like icy water through our blistered hands.
So pour--I'll tell you when I've had too much.
_

#416: Dangerous Intersection

2009-04-11T20:37:00.000-05:00

The corner store is where they always meet,
long after all the windows have gone dark
and only alley cats prowl Dunham Street:
that fatal intersection near the park
where each of them remembers screeching brakes,
the smell of burning rubber, then the sick
flat slap of steel on flesh. It sometimes makes
the youngest of them weep. Their elders pick
the trash and detritus for souvenirs--
a shard of glass they can pretend got broke
on their own mortal coils. As morning nears,
each spirit sighs and dissipates like smoke.

The brand new traffic light reflects the sun.
It's eighteen months since our last hit and run.
_

#415: Gepetto

2009-04-10T21:48:00.000-05:00

Upstairs, in that small room above his shop,
the puppeteer is carving something new;
his gnarled and wrinkled hands know what to do
as all around his feet the shavings drop
like Autumn leaves. His knife blocks out a chin
and notches lips above; the nose a twig
repurposed. Two knotholes will serve for big
blue eyes with just a little paint. Within
the hollow of his chest, where blind grubs ate
scant days ago, the ashes of his boy
now dead these seven years--a father's joy
whose smile made sweet a life he'd grown to hate.

A few more spells, perhaps another day--
his son will live again, and God will pay.
_

#414: Machine

2009-04-09T20:27:00.000-05:00

The bank of instruments and gauges glows
with green, unearthly light; the metal ticks
with heat. Somewhere an ancient mainspring clicks
its coiled potential down, while rows and rows

of switches wait. On each a cryptic rune
is carved (its function? maybe some dead name
important to its maker? All the same,
since none can read them now). Outside the moon

shines blue and cold, and there, at these controls,
a madman sits--brains addled by the tides,
his senseless eyes as red and hot as coals--
with power enough to split the world in two
before him. Elbows tight against his sides,
his fingers itch to see what she can do.
_

#413: Dogs Playing Poker

2009-04-08T16:48:00.001-05:00

They sit quite still, politely placing bets.
The cone of light, tipped with a green glass shade,
encircles them. New cards are dealt and laid.
They mark the passing time in cigarettes.

Reflected in the Pug's huge, umber eyes:
the pair of queens he's holding over tens.
The Afghan sees, and checks. The Beagle wins--
a full boat, rocking aces over threes.

A few more beers, the Boxer wants to fight
("How typical," the Bulldog notes, all gruff).
The Dachshund cashes in and tips his hat,
says Gutentag to all, he's lost enough.
Remaining paws divide the pot; that's that.
No one got bit; in all, a decent night.
_

#412: Oh, Henry

2009-04-07T20:24:00.000-05:00

Oh, Henry Miller! Tell me where you got
your glorious contempt for consequence--
the will to belch and fart at common sense
and dive headlong into a life of Thought.

Such all-encompassing, sweet unconcern
as yours for life and country, health and heart,
such unflagging belief in Truth and Art,
and damn everything else!--these I would learn.

If I had even half the fearless trust
in my peculiar muse, I'd fly to France;
I'd smoke, start drinking barrels of Merlot,
write sonnets just to get down some girl's pants,
and waking in some whorehouse, rise and throw
myself into the Seine in sheer disgust.
_

#411: Desire

2009-04-06T20:16:00.000-05:00

Lie back and put your hands behind your head.
No covering up--that's good. Now spread your thighs.
Open yourself to me. Look in my eyes.
I want to see you sprawled upon the bed,
your nipples hard pink buds, your skin aflame,
the flower of your sex all wet with dew,
breathe in your passion's scent, and cover you
with hungry kisses, whispering your name.

I want to drag my tongue along the line
of calf and inner arm, elbow and knee,
the furrow of your rump. I want to taste
your every flavor, drink you in like wine,
be drunk on you, and make you drunk with me.
We have all night. There is no call for haste.
_

#410: Mulligan 3

2009-04-05T21:17:00.000-05:00

Some nights you have it, other nights you don't.
Now guess which kind of nigth this one might be?
Sometimes the muses will, sometimes they won't,
and no use being a jerk about it, see?

I've got a few ideas I kick around,
a line or two composed and good to go,
some incidental music, striking sounds,
But will they come together now? Hell no.

I hate to write like this; it seems a cheat
to spout iambs, beat them like a drum
As if to count to ten were such a feat,
I guess it's either this or sit here dumb.

What's better--silence, or misshapen air?
That answer I don't know--and don't much care.
_

#409: Saturday with the Kids

2009-04-04T21:32:00.000-05:00

It used to be, a weekend was two days
of fun and frolic, hours without a care;
we'd wake up with the morning's warming rays
near changed to afternoon--now such is rare.

We used to read our books in quiet peace,
sometimes all afternoon, and then at night
we'd go out to a club (dinner at least)
and make love till the dawn--that was all right.

But nowadays, it's up at six a. m.;
it's playdates, soccer games, overnight guests.
It never can be us, it's always them,
and gone is peace and quiet, sex and rest.

They scoff, "You'll miss it one day, just you wait!"
Maybe--but on that day, I'll sleep in late.

_

#408: The Bright Side

2009-04-03T16:55:00.000-05:00

Let's try to see the bright side: most work days
the sun comes up, and you have things to do.
Your idle hands are where the Devil plays,
and staying busy's known to breed virtue.

The code comes hard and steady all day long--
yeah, sure, it's not exciting, but so what?
It sure beats digging ditches, am I wrong?
You want to sell fast food? That's what I thought.

By now I've learned just what a sucker's game
it is, to seek fulfillment in your work.
Whether you smile or not, the pay's the same;
so cash the checks. Stop moping like a jerk.

Hell, twenty years from now you'll wonder why
you ever wanted more. And then you'll die.
_

#407: The Hazards of Marrying an English Major

2009-04-02T14:01:00.000-05:00

My loved one has to be a Grammar Nazi,
Correcting me at every small mistake;
It makes her feel all smug and hotsy-totsy
to get her digs in while I'm half awake;

A typo in an email brings down thunder;
A misplaced adjective will stoke the flames.
There's hell to pay for every tiny blunder:
arch ridicule and denigrating names.

If I could diagram her in a sentence,
The subject and object of my desire,
We could forget anal retentive nonsense
And just wink at my dangling modifier;

Alas, though--it has yet to come to that.
Now, where'd I leave that darn red pencil at?
_

#406: Mulligan 2

2009-04-02T01:30:00.000-05:00

There's nothing to it but to do it now;
I'm churning out another piece of junk.
Just get the ink blots down and don't mind how--
without some inspiration, it's just bunk.

And yet the show goes on, the way a clown
might tell his jokes to seats covered with dust:
nobody there to cheer or smile or frown--
but anyway, it helps knock off the rust.

So maybe, should I stay in shape this way--
no waiting for my muse, just ink and sweat--
perhaps when I find something good to say
I'll find myself strong, fit to bear it yet.

That's why I grind it out day after day;
I keep telling myself that, anyway.
_

#405: Because Such Distractions of Beauty Cannot Bet Left toStand

2009-03-31T20:23:00.000-05:00

Out yesterday, along a path that led
behind a dozen houses on my street
I suddenly smelled honeysuckle flowers.
The sweetness of their perfume made me turn
and break through brambles till my shins were lined
with scratches and my ankles burned. In pain,
I trailed that sunny odor to its source.

Perhaps I half expected godly bowers
where Venus, ringed with cherubim, entwined
her earthly lovers. What I found instead:
a grumpy neighbor rooting out the sweet
gold blossoms and green vines from where her chain
link fence was set. She piled them high to burn.
She smiled and shrugged. I understood, of course.
_

#404: Pediatrician's Appointment

2009-03-30T20:25:00.001-05:00

The longer they were gone, the more it seemed
that something must be wrong; he tried to think
of harmless things, but something in him screamed
it was all lies. The monsters in the sink
of his black thoughts raised up their heads and danced.
They sang the names of all their progeny--
bone cancer, diabetes--devil rants
occluding all his rationality.

And when at last they walked back through the door,
the doctor's good report clear in their eyes,
he could have wept for joy--except he knew
this was a moment's respite; there were more
worries ahead, more nights of fearful sighs--
years yet for all his nightmares to come true.
_

#403: Night Encounter

2009-03-29T20:43:00.001-05:00

A fog lay nestled close against the ground
that night, and up above the moon's white eye,
half-lidded, stared us down. The only sound:
the squeaking of the bats. Old Ned and I
sat in the cabin. I turned bleary eyes
on that back window where the Thing had shown
itself the last three nights. Across my thighs,
a loaded rifle. Ha! Had I but known
what kind of thing was lurking in that mist--
What fearsome claws! What eyes of burning flame!
--I would have held my Bible there instead,
or spent the evening taking Eucharist.
At least God showed His mercy to Old Ned;
he was asleep and dreaming when It came.
_

#402: Annabelle

2009-03-28T20:27:00.000-05:00

So once upon a time, I had this horse:
I called her Annabelle--that was her name.
I swear the sunlight was her power source;
on clear-sky days she'd run, tail like a flame
behind her, hooves that barely touched the ground
beneath, and up above, the sun and me.

She'd jolt my spine with every leap and bound
till my ears rang and I could barely see,
But still, tears down my face, I gave her rein;
sometimes she'd go for miles, until at last
a cloud obscured the sun. Then she would halt.
I'd clamber down, bow-legged and in pain,
but never angry; it was not her fault.
She had to chase the Sun; and He was fast.
_

#401: Another Friday Job

2009-03-27T13:42:00.000-05:00

Why is it every Friday afternoon
I get so lazy, lose my will to write?
I put the pen to paper, sure, but soon
it's back to themes like this, cliched and trite.

A piece about *not* writing poetry
has always seemed a cop-out most obtuse;
It's navel-gazing to the nth degree,
for which I normally have little use.

But now in my old age I understand
why poets do this time and time again--
it's watching the poetic grains of sand
slip through, until the weekend can begin.

If in this battle I turn tail and flee,
At least I know I'm in good company.
_

#400: Storm Front, with Pines

2009-03-26T21:56:00.000-05:00

God put a gray lid on the sky today
and pressed down hard; the belly of the storm
seems inches higher than the trees that sway
beneath, and every pine now changes form

into a giant's spear, whose needle tip
wil pierce whatever cloud should fly too low,
like cutting through a wineskin, and the rip
will spill the thunderstorm on all below.

But still the clouds maintain integrity;
the tall pines waver gently in the breeze
and do no harm to man nor earth nor cloud.
And something in their motion speaks to me,
as if their calming souls whispered aloud
and offered up the wisdom of the trees.
_

#399: The Case of the Missing Shoes

2009-03-25T16:38:00.000-05:00

Don't talk to me about your missing shoes
Unless you've something humorous to say.
You've got to see the funny side, okay?
It's really an uncommon thing to lose.

You don't have to get mad, although you may--
You'd be within your rights, no question there--
but wouldn't it be better not to care?
Just shrug and chuckle: "Oh man, what a day!"

The cops? You're kidding, right? I've got some news
for you: they won't go hunt a purloined pair
of sneakers, man. Who says crime doesn't pay?
Stop leaving those damn things under your chair
perhaps, and--search my office? I refuse!
Just what are you implying, anyway?
_

#398: Dear Editor(s)

2009-03-24T16:24:00.000-05:00

Oh, please reject me--please! Here, take my piece
and crumple it into a paper ball,
then throw it in my face, or at the wall
and bank it in the bin. If your release

Is quick enough (I hear it's in the wrist),
you might get one more poem in the air
before the first sinks--that's pizazz, right there!
Now try a three-point shot--no, I insist!

Without some sadomasochistic streak,
a need to know my stuff's not any good,
would I send it your way? Maybe I would--
but then, God knows, my outlook might grow bleak.

So fire away! I've got sonnets to burn.
Then maybe, one day, it'll be my turn.
_

#397: Disappear

2009-03-23T16:31:00.000-05:00

One day, the ones we love will disappear
and in the spaces where they used to be
an empty outline only we can see
will mark their absence. Time to time we'll hear

a voice almost like theirs, perhaps a phrase
they used to speak in laughter or in tears,
the cadence like an echo in our ears
of songs we sang before, in brighter days.

We're destined to be haunted in this way
or else to haunt the ones we leave behind;
That's how it is, and how it's always been.
We'll leave, and where we go no one can say,
these memories a perfume to remind
us all of blooms we cannot pluck again.
_

#396: Rock Star

2009-03-22T20:36:00.000-05:00

I could have been a rock star--up on stage,
I'd bang my head and dance under the lights,
play my guitar while groupies half my age
would wrestle for the honors of my nights;

My music videos on MTV
(or youtube rather now, like everyone),
more cash than I could ever spend on me,
and my day job description: having fun;

I could have got tattoos and pierced my tongue,
and driven fancy sports cars everywhere,
sampled the newest drugs and oldest sins;
made it a game to lead astray the young,
divorced my model wife for our au pair...

Say now--why did I not do that again?

_

#395: A New Worry

2009-03-21T16:46:00.000-05:00

As if you had not taken yet enough
from me of Life's enjoyment, span of years,
and nights of rest--another cause for fears
slides suddenly from your pressed, black suit cuff

And flutters to the ground, it's brazen face
turned up for all to see: the Deuce of Spades.
And so another nightmare thought invades
a mind where calm seldom enough has place.

I think of you, a skull whose grinning teeth
are rotten, in your fist a sugar bowl
you sprinkle in the bloodstreams of your prey.
If there were one gift I would not bequeath
my child, one wish I'd barter for my soul--
but you, Devil, take even that away.
_

#394: Billy's Gone Away

2009-03-20T11:32:00.000-05:00

Young Billy hooked the cables to his head
(he'd wrapped a hanger round his temples, tight)
and threw the switch--some smoke, a little light.
"I must be doing something wrong," he said.

He tinkered with the box a little bit,
tightened a couple screws he found were loose,
adjusted half the gauges, checked the juice,
and put the top back on again. "That's it."

And this time, luminescence filled the shack;
his face took on a weird, unearthly glow.
He cried, "Eureka!" every hair on end,
and vanished into smoke. That's all I know.
Wherever Billy's gone, he won't be back.
I hope he's happy there--Godspeed, my friend.
_

#393: Disgruntled

2009-03-19T19:16:00.000-05:00

I wish I had a Robo-Kicko-Bot
to follow me around all day at work
and put its boots to anyone I thought
was acting like a snotty, pompous jerk;

He'd give his good swift kick to worker drones
who spend the whole day snuffling like bears;
and salesmen, welded to their tiny phones,
best not let KickBot catch them unawares!

I guess I must absolve the CEO,
and payroll folks--the ones who cut the checks;
but everybody else, look out below!
Robotic justice comes--you could be next!

Behave--and should you need me to remind you
the reason why...well, friend, just look behind you!
_

#392: The World I Cannot Reach

2009-03-18T20:52:00.000-05:00

If there must be a world I cannot reach,
it might as well be beautiful and green;
let breezes bearing petals kiss the hills
and ruffle grasses like a child's hair;

And let the sun set gold there, like a peach;
let purple-flower clouds complete the scene,
where silver-armored fish sleep in the rills
and nothing gentle, pure, or good is rare.

If I must stay here, trapped in glass and steel,
where nothing blooms, where everything is gray,
I think I'll bear it better if I know:

The world I cannot reach is warm and real,
and all are happy there who've found the way
and someone (if not I, then you) may go.
_

#391: Down the Pub

2009-03-17T22:04:00.001-05:00

Come on and pour the ale out for us, lass!
Give us a jar and fill it to its rim;
The nights are long, the fire is growing dim,
And nothing hates us like an empty glass.

It's Guinness, black and bitter as the years
We've spent alone, our friends and family lost;
A round for all, barmaid, and damn the cost!
This potion's fit to banish all such fears.

Or else it's Bass, as warm and brown as wood
Tossed in the stove to chase away the chill;
Or maybe something stronger by the gill--
A dram of whisky sure would do us good.

Time marches on, it's no use to resist;
So let us face it: brave, unbowed--and pissed.
_

#391: Down the Pub

2009-03-17T22:04:00.000-05:00

#390: Lunae Infinitum

2009-03-16T20:43:00.000-05:00

Another Monday down--how many more?
Let's see...what's fifty-two times thirty-five?
(It could be thirty-six or thirty-four,
that's just an estimate. If I'm alive

A decade more than that, well that's just cake!
But you can't count on it; Therefore I won't.)
That's eighteen-hundred-twenty, give or take.
But wait--there's something I forgot. You don't

Count holidays; but then it gets too hard.
You have to break out calendars and such!
Say eighteen hundred flat. That's clears the card
of Mondays for a lifetime--not too much,

And this one's nearly done! That's one less, now.
Chin up, my lad! You'll make it through--somehow.
_

#389: Sunday Night Clean-Up

2009-03-15T19:06:00.000-05:00

It's Sunday night--we cannot now ignore
the mess the kids have made; it must be faced:
the action figures strewn across the floor
as though some massacre had taken place;

A horse's head lies, mounted on a stick,
like some Godfather's warning in your bed;
a Nerf Gun choice of weapons--take your pick--
or have a Jedi lightsaber instead!

Stuffed animals like trophies from a hunt,
and one splayed, naked, shameless Barbie doll.
The leavings of some spry, tornadic runt
already snug and sleeping down the hall.

Ah, hell, let's leave it there another day;
and if it gets too bad--we'll move away.
_