Tuesday Poem: "Poetry is Political" by Leslie D. Bush

 

Poetry is political?

How can this be

Can society be upended

Divided by a love poem?

Poets are political?

Yes. No. Maybe

Some examples

Perhaps

Poets don’t tell

The literal truth

(Who does?)

They see things

That are not necessarily 

There. Do continue.

See motives when such

Motives might not exist

Interesting, pray continue

(to dig yourself into a hole)

The truth is grey, everybody knows

Why do you paint it white as snow

Or blood stained, by death in the masses

Do these things not happen?

Are they not motivated by and acted on

By humans? I write what I see

You say, poetry is political

Do you mean, designed to misinform

Not to tell the truth? To inflame the minds

Of the proletariat, to put the powerful at risk?

You can’t be too careful, can you?

Yes, poets and poetry ARE political

In the sense they are human

Producing human creations

Yes, poems are political

They are narratives, they choose a side

And argue their case, assertively

Honestly. Do you fear debate?

It would be imprecise to say

Poetry is truth. It is not the opposite

By purpose. A poet seeks the truth

Either literally or metaphorically

Nothing less will satisfy them

So, yes, poetry is a political act

So is breathing. Going to ban that?

by Leslie D. Bush

Tuesday Poem; "What Belongs to Us" by Marie Howe

Not the memorized phone numbers.

The carefully rehearsed short cuts home.

Not the summer shimmering like pavement, when Lucia
pushed Billy off the rabbit house and broke his arm

or our tiny footprints in the black files.

Not the list of kings from Charlemagne to Henry

not the boxes under our beds

or Tommy’s wedding day when it was so hot and Mark played the flute
and we waved at him waving from the small round window in the loft

the great gangs of people stepping one by one into the cold water.

I have, of course, a photograph
you and I getting up from a couch.

Full height, I stand almost two inches taller than you
but the photograph doesn’t show that
just the two of us in motion
not looking at each other, smiling.

Not even the way we said things, leaning against the kitchen counter.

Not the cabin where I burned my arm and you said, oh, you’re the type
that even if it hurt, you wouldn’t say.

Not even the blisters. Look.

by Marie Howe 

For more information see:

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/marie-howe

Tuesday Poem: "Winter's Formulae" by Tomas Tranströmer

Walked along the antipoetic wall.
Die Mauer. Don't look over.
It wants to surround our adult lives
in the routine city, the routine landscape.

Eluard touched some button
and the wall opened
and the garden showed itself.

I used to go with the milk pail through the wood.
Purple trunks on all sides.
An old joke in there
as beautiful as a votive ship. 

Summer read out of Pickwick Papers.
The good life, a tranquil carriage
crowded with excited gentlemen.

Close your eyes, change horses.

In distress come childish thoughts.
We sat by the sickbed and prayed
for a pause in the terror, a breach
where the Pickwicks could pull in.

Close your eyes, change horses.

It is easy to love fragments
that have been on the way a long time.
Inscriptions on church bells
and proverbs written across saints
and many-thousand-year-old seeds.

Archilochos! -- No answer!

The birds roamed over the seas' rough pelt.
We locked ourselves in with Simenon
and felt the smell of human life
where the serials debouch.

Feel the smell of truth.

The open window has stopped
in front of the treetops here
and the evening sky's farewell letter.

Shiki, Björling and Ungaretti
with life's chalks on the death's blackboard. 
The poem which is completely possible.

I looked up when the branches swung.
White gulls were eating black cherries.

 by Tomas Tranströmer (translated from the Swedish by May Swenson)

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/arts/swedish-poet-transtromer-awarded-nobel-prize-in-poetry

Tuesday Poem: "War/Love/Nature/Life" (a combination of Haiku and Senryu) by Gabrielle de Haan-Skitt

 

This is what poet, Gabrielle de Haan-Skitt, says about herself, her poetry and her life:

Have I always loved Nature? Yes, it's who I am, the threads that bind me to find solace. Leaving my home in Aotearoa New Zealand, I then went to school in Holland. From there I travelled, worked and lived in many foreign countries observing culture and religion. I felt like a caged exotic bird but one day the bird flew and became part of the melody of Haikus and Senryu.

Tuesday Poem: "Driving With Madness" by Emma-Jane Uren

My madness is the friend who I like to take on road trips. 

They are an amazing travel companion, giving me directions and teaching me new ways to get to places to catch the scenery… 
But I hate it when my Madness is behind the wheel. 
My Madness is a reckless driver, they swerve all over the road, shouting and screaming maniacally.
 They don’t give a shit about the speed limit or anyone else for that matter. 
I wrestle with them to pull over, pleading with them to stop. 
And then… as I try to gain control of the car, we wind up in a ditch. 
The car is munted, thankfully we’re ok and it isn’t a complete write-off… 
My Madness is gutted, and sad and broken… and so am I. 
The car that I saved up so hard for, the car I fought for, now sports a few more dents, adding to the last time I let my Madness take control… 
It’s my turn now to drive… My Madness takes the passenger seat again… switches on the radio and together we start singing along to our favourite song and we laugh. 
My Madness pinky promises me not to take the wheel again, and I promise not to let them… 
But then again, some promises are made to be broken…  

by Emma-Jane Uren

Emma-Jane Uren is an Otautahi/Christchurch-based poet and this is what she has to say about herself:

"I'm EJ. I'm an expert tea slurper, awkward conversationalist, passionate (yet terrible) ukulele player and singer-songwriter, laughter yoga enthusiast, mad poet and diarist.  I'm always on the lookout for new and interesting people to write about and share my chippies with!"

Emma-Jane Uren is a member of the "Mad Poets and Creatives Collective" who can be found on Facebook at:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/madpoetscanterbury/.

Tuesday Poem: "Saturation" by Kelly Pope

 

How much salt could I pour 
Between the syllables of this poem before 
It is over-saturated?
Idolised crystals spilling onto paper 
getting in that un-worn space 
Between the pages and the spine 
Causing dull pain 
Under bitten fingernails 
Chewed in indecision at each newly written line 
Seasoning reheated thai takeaways 
Rimming margarita glasses 
Adding cynicism to our laughter 
Falling behind our shoulders as we pray 
For these poems 
For the canaries in the coalmines 
And for the miners 
For all the things symmetrical and neat 
Like sheets tucked in, hospital corners 
For the barren fields abandoned 
 

by Kelly Pope

Tuesday Poem (Song): "Deeper Water" by Paul Kelly

 

On a crowded beach in a distant time At the height of summer see a boy of five At the water′s edge so nimble and free

Jumping over the ripples, looking way out to sea Now a man comes up from amongst the throng Takes the young boy's hand and his hand is strong And the child feels safe and the child feels brave As he′s carried in those arms up and over the waves Deeper water, Deeper water, Deeper water, Is calling him on Let's move forward now and the child's seventeen With a girl in the back seat tugging at his jeans And she knows what she wants, she guides with her hand As a voice cries inside him - "I′m a man, I′m a man!" Deeper water, Deeper water, Deeper water, Is calling him on Now the man meets a woman unlike all the rest Well, he doesn't know it yet but he′s out of his depth And he thinks he can run, it's a matter of pride But he keeps coming back like a cork on the tide (Deeper water,) (Deeper water,) Now the years hurry by and the woman loves the man Then one night in the dark she grabs hold of his hand Says "there, can you feel it kicking inside"? And the man gets a shiver right up and down his spine Deeper water, (Deeper water,) Deeper water, (Deeper water,) Deeper water, (Deeper water,) Is calling him on Yeah the clock moves around and the child is a joy But Death doesn′t care just who it destroys Now the woman gets sick, thins down to the bone She says "where I'm going next, I′m going alone" (Deeper water,) (Deeper water,) On a distant beach lonely and wild At a later time see a man and a child And the man takes the child up into his arms Takes her over the breakers To where the water is calm Deeper water, (Deeper water,) Deeper water, (Deeper water,) Deeper water, (Deeper water,) Deeper water, (Deeper water)

by Paul Kelly

For more information about Australian musician, Paul Kelly, see:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Kelly_(Australian_musician)

Tuesday Poem: Dachshunds with erections can't climb stairs" by Les Barker

 

Each night she's on the balcony
He loves her from afar
His soft, sad eyes are hypnotised
She shines down like a star.
His heart will break forever
His kind can't have affairs
For Dachshunds with erections...
Can't climb stairs.
His home's a humble bungalow
And her's a penthouse flat
He cannot go where she can go
And that, they say. is that.
He never can be near her
Although she knows he cares
For Dachshunds with erections...
Can't climb stairs.

You want to win a woman?
Just be cool... be aloof
The dog who doesn't hit the stairs
Can make it to the roof.
The dog who doesn't care
Will be the dog who wins the day
You'll never get to heaven...
With your chopper in the way.

The spirit soars, the body falls
And heavy lies the heart
That cries out with the pain of love
Be still my broken part.
How painful is the passion
And painful the repairs
For Dachshunds with erections
Can't climb stairs.

by Les Barker

For more information about poet, Les Barker, see:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Barker

National Poetry Day 2023: "How Poetry Got Her Hooks in Me" by Andrew M. Bell

It is an ancient Poet

and he stoppeth me.

“Beware of poetry, my son,

She’s a gold digger.

She’ll chew you up and spit you out, 

leave you penniless and lying in a gutter,

drunk on absinthe,

while the rich novelists and scriptwriters

step over you, laughing.”

 

“Hold off! unhand me, greybeard loon!”

Unheeding, I slunk off to my garret

to compose a villanelle, 

heavily derivative of Dylan Thomas.

 

I only wanted to get girls,

but before I knew it

I was roaming with the Romantics,

bopping with the Beats

and cruising with the Classicists.

Popping some Pope, shooting some Stevie Smith

or hitting up Heaney,

I was hopelessly addicted.

And I never did get the girl.

by Andrew M. Bell

Photo credit: Alison Gilmore

For more information about poet, Andrew M. Bell, see:

https://ambell4.wixsite.com/andrew-m-bell-author/bio

Tuesday Poem (Song): "Just Like Heaven" by The Cure

"Show me, show me, show me how you do that trick
The one that makes me scream", she said
"The one that makes me laugh", she said
And threw her arms around my neck

Show me how you do it
And I promise you, I promise that
I'll run away with you
I'll run away with you

Spinning on that dizzy edge
Kissed her face and kissed her head
Dreamed of all the different ways 
I had to make her glow
"Why are you so far away?", she said
"Why won't you ever know that I'm in love with you
That I'm in love with you?"

You
Soft and only
You
Lost and lonely
You
Strange as angels
Dancing in the deepest oceans
Twisting in the water
You're just like a dream
You're just like a dream

Daylight licked me into shape
I must've been asleep for days
And moving lips to breathe her name
I opened up my eyes
And found myself alone, alone
Alone above a raging sea
That stole the only girl I loved
And drowned her deep inside of me

You
Soft and lonely
You
Lost and lonely
You
Just like heaven

by Robert James Smith/Boris Williams/Laurence Andrew Tolhurst/Porl Thompson and Simon Johnathon Gallup 

Robert Smith, in my humble opinion, has tended to be underrated as a crafter of perfect pop songs. When I use the term "pop", I mean it in a positive not derogatory way. A perfect pop song is a thing of beauty and although it might sound as though it was easy to write, it was not. Robert Smith and his co-songwriters get in and get out in 3 minutes and 30 seconds approximately because they understand what makes a perfect pop song. Always leave the listener wanting. There are not many perfect pop songs in contemporary popular music, but I think Just Like Heaven is a shining example.

Tuesday Poem: "Recension day" by Duncan Forbes

 

Unburn the boat, rebuild the bridge,
Reconsecrate the sacrilege,
Unspill the milk, decry the tears,
Turn back the clock, relive the years
Replace the smoke inside the fire,
Unite fulfilment with desire,
Undo the done, gainsay the said,
Revitalise the buried dead,
Revoke the penalty and the clause,
Reconstitute unwritten laws,
Repair the heart, untie the tongue,
Change faithless old to hopeful young,
Inure the body to disease
And help me to forget you please.

by Duncan Forbes

For more information on poet, Duncan Forbes, see:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duncan_Forbes_(poet)

Tuesday Poem: "3.10" by Maggie Milner

Some mornings, leaving my girlfriend’s
     house, I’d glimpse my whole existence,

all its eras, as a single arc—unified, unbroken.
     I saw a person who kissed mostly men,

wrote poems in the prevailing style, owned a cat.
     I saw a different person after that,

and before, I saw a little girl.
     What was I saying? That there were

these different selves—I need you to see them—
     they were shapes made out of lines, and then

one day they all began to cross, the lines,
     as if by some obscure design

the analysis of which became the purpose
     of my life. Or maybe the pattern was 

my life, and its analysis
     merely my living. Sexuality is,

after all, a formal concern: 
     finding for one’s time on earth

a shape that feels more native than imposed—
     a shape in which desire, having chosen

it, can multiply.
     And isn’t love itself a type

of rhyme? And don’t gender and genre share one root?
     Maybe I really am a poet,

needing as I do from these imperfect sets,
     which constitute a self, the lie of sense.

 by Maggie Milner

See:

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/maggie-millner

Tuesday Poem: "Homage to Sharon Stone" by Lynn Emanuel

It's early morning. This is the "before,"
the world hanging around in its wrapper,
blowzy, frumpy, doing nothing: my 
neighbors, hitching themselves to the roles
of the unhappily married, trundle their three
mastiffs down the street. I am writing this
book of poems. My name is Lynn Emanuel.
I am wearing a bathrobe and curlers; from 
my lips, a Marlboro drips ash on the text.
It is the third of September nineteen**.
And as I am writing this in my trifocals
and slippers, across the street, Sharon Stone,
her head swollen with curlers, her mouth
red and narrow as a dancing slipper, 
is rushed into a black limo. And because
these limos snake up and down my street,
this book will be full of sleek cars nosing
through the shadowy ocean of these words.
Every morning, Sharon Stone, her head
in a helmet of hairdo, wearing a visor
of sunglasses, is engulfed by a limo
the size of a Pullman, and whole fleets
of these wind their way up and down
the street, day after day, giving to the street
(Liberty Avenue in Pittsburgh, PA)
and the book I am writing, an aspect
that is both glamorous and funereal.
My name is Lynn Emanuel, and in this
book I play the part of someone writing 
a book, and I take the role seriously, 
just as Sharon Stone takes seriously 
the role of the diva. I watch the dark 
cars disappear her and in my poem 
another Pontiac erupts like a big animal 
at the cool trough of a shady curb. So, 
when you see this black car, do not think 
it is a Symbol For Something. It is just 
Sharon Stone driving past the house 
of Lynn Emanuel who is, at the time, 
trying to write a book of poems.

Or you could think of the black car as 
Lynn Emanuel, because, really, as an author,
I have always wanted to be a car, even 
though most of the time I have to be 
the "I," or the woman hanging wash; 
I am a woman, one minute, then I am a man, 
I am a carnival of Lynn Emanuels:
Lynn in the red dress; Lynn sulking 
behind the big nose of my erection; 
then I am the train pulling into the station 
when what I would really love to be is 
Gertrude Stein spying on Sharon Stone 
at six in the morning. But enough about 
that, back to the interior decorating:
On the page, the town looks bald
and dim so I turn up the amps on 
the radioactive glances of bad boys. 
In a kitchen, I stack pans sleek with 
grease, and on a counter there is a roast 
beef red as a face in a tantrum. Amid all 
this bland strangeness is Sharon Stone, 
who, like an engraved invitation, is asking 
me, Won't you, too, play a role? I do not 
choose the black limo rolling down the street 
with the golden stare of my limo headlights 
bringing with me the sun, the moon, and 
Sharon Stone. It is nearly dawn; the sun 
is a fox chewing her foot from the trap; 
every bite is a wound and every wound 
is a red window, a red door, a red road. 
My name is Lynn Emanuel. I am the writer 

trying to unwrite the world that is all around her.

by Lynn Emanuel 

For information about Lynn Emanuel see:

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/lynn-emanuel

Special Post on Tuesday Poem: "Black Boys on Mopeds", "The Last Day of Our Acquaintance" by Sinead O'Connor and "Nothing Compares 2 U" by Prince and performed by Sinead O'Connor 1966-2023 RIP

 

Black Boys on Mopeds by Sinead O'Connor

The Last Day of Our Acquaintance by Sinead O'Connor

Nothing Compares 2 U by Prince

Performed by the incomparable Sinead O'Connor

Sinead O'Connor was my hero and a true Irish hero.

I was absolutely shocked and saddened to hear on the Midday News on Radio New Zealand that she had died at the far-too-young age of 56.

Rest assured, Sinead, a beautiful soul like yours will go to Heaven and, from up there, you can look down on the past Popes of the Catholic Church burning in hell.

RIP Sinead O'Connor, you deserve peace finally.

Tuesday Poem: "Filling Station" by Elizabeth Bishop

Oh, but it is dirty!

—this little filling station, 
oil-soaked, oil-permeated 
to a disturbing, over-all 
black translucency. 
Be careful with that match!

Father wears a dirty, 
oil-soaked monkey suit 
that cuts him under the arms, 
and several quick and saucy 
and greasy sons assist him 
(it's a family filling station), 
all quite thoroughly dirty.

Do they live in the station? 
It has a cement porch 
behind the pumps, and on it 
a set of crushed and grease-
impregnated wickerwork; 
on the wicker sofa 
a dirty dog, quite comfy.

Some comic books provide 
the only note of color—
of certain color. They lie 
upon a big dim doily 
draping a taboret 
(part of the set), beside 
a big hirsute begonia.

Why the extraneous plant? 
Why the taboret? 
Why, oh why, the doily? 
(Embroidered in daisy stitch 
with marguerites, I think, 
and heavy with gray crochet.)

Somebody embroidered the doily. 
Somebody waters the plant, 
or oils it, maybe. Somebody 
arranges the rows of cans 
so that they softly say:
ESSO—SO—SO—SO
to high-strung automobiles. 

Somebody loves us all.

by Elizabeth Bishop

Photo by Bettmann / Getty Images


For more information about Elizabeth Bishop, see:

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/elizabeth-bishop