Writing in the Snow

     Snowstorms make a wonderful environment for writing. You can't leave the house even if you want to and nothing sparks the imagination more than millions of snowflakes blurring everything in sight.

     I've said before that poetry isn't exactly my strong suit, but I find it to be a great way to improve wording and brevity. One of my favorite forms of poems is the sestina, which I actually didn't know about until just under two years ago. The concept is that there are seven stanzas and the lines of the first six all end in the same six words. Keeping the poem interesting turns out to be quite difficult when you limit your vocabulary and you quickly learn to use the words in unique ways. I've posted two poems today, this one a sestina, and the other just a brief one I spent about an hour on earlier and pretty much threw words down. Not quite the attention they deserve, but hopefully they are fun nonetheless:

Father, Flag and Fortune

The old man exposed, his body at rest.

To not look away took all of our might.

Limp and lifeless, his mind did not work,

But we knew there was nothing else he could want

Than to be where he was if this day was his last.

It was for him to keep, not yours and not mine.

His father had worked shoveling coal from a mine,

His mother a sexton, who put dead to rest,

They were both drinkers, and he at long last

Decided to see the whole world if he might.

But scared that he would be helpless and want

He signed up for the Army, as he needed to work.

But fighting for freedom could never be work,

For freedom, he found himself eager to mine

From the clamping jaws of greed and want,

So his family and friends would be free to rest.

He and the soldiers flaunted their might

To ensure that the world they knew would last.

But on the battlefield he witnessed the last

Small piece of glory fade into work.

With one false step, war had shattered his might

For under his foot he had triggered a mine

In under a second his body at rest,

And being at home was all he could want.

His body was crippled and, of a mind, want.

Of moving or thinking he had known his last.

At least the dead were afforded their rest.

All but damned, he strained under the work

For his mind knew not your figure or mine.

Though we wished him to recall with all of our might.

We could not forget his unparalleled might

Though of memories of us, he was thoroughly want.

You said your grievances and I said mine,

But we knew our flowers would not last.

To keep from crying was impossible work,

When his soul, not ours, was the one at rest.

I held your hand and you held mine as we squeezed with all of our might

We could not rest with him unaware, but his peace was all we could want

His life had come to an end at last, and we would never forget his work.

Strangled

Locked up inside

Strapped down and tied

By these alibis

And eternal lies

Claw, scratch and bleed

Bloodlust and greed

All hope to heal

Encaged by steel

Choking on tears

Expunging fears

Breathe deep and squeeze

Pain and unease

Red, black and blue

The colors we knew

Let’s hope they fade to gray.

II and III

II is dead because he had

no voice no words no mouth no thoughts

grinding enamel on dry enamel.

Count the perforations on the dirty white ceiling.

A shadow, a memory, a flag stuffed in a box.

Sterile air and blinding walls

Suck the air from his mouth, but

leave the stick and suffocation.

She waited -- festering, swelling

III would come but II

would be gone.

Leave her in the middle.

Three quarters of a year

and II left his scar -- but

III beat in her heart.

Tickle the air in her nostrils.

Two became one became two again

and they screamed

as two missing their third

never alone but never whole.

Nighttime Nostalgia

     I'm not very good at poetry. Never have been, and probably never will be. That being said, I enjoy writing songs and poems. I have a comfort zone in prose that just needs to crumble every now and again. I found a poem last night that I hadn't seen in awhile and thought it might be fun to post, so I tinkered with it just enough that I felt it might be half worthy of sharing. It's not very good, but the emotion I felt at the time still rings true.

Shadows

We don’t cast any shadows.

We bend and blend, but the sun

     will never tell you where we start

and where we -- end.

We are alive but we are bleeding,

     blood that doesn’t blow

away

     when the wind whirls us around

We met a girl as sharp as ice

who didn’t bend and didn’t blend

    she just --

broke.

Sometimes we wish we could break.

that we could

     s h a t t e r

so you could slice your hand on our edges

So that our pieces fall like brimstone,

fire and rain on the

     -- blackened buildings --

putting holes in the dusty ground

We are dangling from a ..tightrope..

     we can push and we --

can pull, but we --

don’t cast any shadows. 

Beauty in Both

            One of the reasons I am glad to be back in the South is that Fall is my favorite season. Fall doesn’t really exist in certain parts of the northeast. Summer just dissolves into snow.

           Most people who like Autumn would tell you it’s because of the leaves. It’s a fairly odd reason when you stop and analyze it. People find beauty in dying foliage. The leaves discolor and die, and that’s what people find most beautiful for a quarter of the year.

Changing Leaves at Radnor Lake

            I looked out my window earlier, trying to figure out why people found so much beauty in such a morbid event. All the changing leaves really indicate is that the weather is about to be colder than you’d like for longer than you’d like. As I thought, my inner nerd took over and I remembered two quotes I had read over my years of art and literature studies.

        One of my favorite artists is Michelangelo, who once observed “beauty is the purging of superfluities.” The statement certainly seemed applicable. For the next few months the trees wouldn’t need their leaves, making them superfluous. At its core, the quotation really only implies beauty in simplicity, and there’s not much that’s simpler than a tree without leaves. It’s pretty much a big stick in the ground. The justification didn’t feel complete, though. The leaves are beautiful because they are suddenly unnecessary? Sure it seems philosophically profound, but I just didn’t believe that millions of people loved Autumn because the leaves were suddenly unnecessary.

             If you have read any Ralph Waldo Emerson, you may have come across the poem The Rhodora. I’ve copied a portion of it below, but you can view the whole poem here:

Emerson's The Rhodora

Rhodora! if the sages ask thee why 


This charm is wasted on the earth and sky, 


Tell them, dear, that if eyes were made for seeing, 


Then Beauty is its own excuse for being:

The last line I’ve copied is the heart of the poem, and provided my answer. I had been searching for a purpose or pragmatism for the beauty of autumn. As Emerson writes, however, beauty, in both man and nature, isn’t a measure of usefulness. Beauty doesn’t need an overarching cause. Beauty is because the eye can see it. Beauty simply is.

            Here’s to man, nature, and beauty in both.