Snapshot 23 March 02005

     50 people see sadness and happiness
        Originally uploaded by brevity.

This day passed as quickly
   as yesterday, no sunrise,
only a lightening of sky
   and later, a darkening.
Rain washing down on

snow, then snow on rain.
   A measure of solitude.
A measure of sadness.
   Four a.m. awake in that
border space. Ice fog

to the ground. What do I
   look for in this place? Some-
thing that hides in the day. Some
   color, some shape undimmed
by pragmatism. Some measure of joy.

24 March: Do not miss the comment on this post, which is far more lyrical and punchy than I can manage at present. I like it, it makes me want to get up and dance -- even though I believe it is a pointed observation on the prosaic nature of this inadequate poem, above.

I am so distressed by the Terry Schaivo case; it is so close it makes
my bones shudder. I am near to a vitriolic public rage, & try to keep
it in bounds -- but it leaks in this poem; the despair. I know I need
to write, something, on point -- but I resist with every grief
avoiding tear in my body.

Still, it may come.

Comments

[Jan Manzwotz]

Yo tiny town word teasers,
whaazzup with yers?
I tell yer what about me is
that I'm dead busy 'n up to all sorts of daftness
in me own mind.
I'm a full time unemployed penniless poet
and I've just been offered a well paid voluntary position
bein' a global news hound,
reviewin for the World Poetry Council Collective;
but it's a bit tricky at the mo
coz I'm banged up on the secure unit of Ward 11.

However, hope is at hand coz
if youse lot out there in virtual world
can rustle up a snatch squad
and have a do at smuggling me past the nurses
when showtime explodes on the pages of cyberspace,
I'm your number one hack,
firin' on all the ink cylindrical spikes
I can stick in and go to OD heaven on,
you squeeze feelin' trainee corpses.

Just tell me sister about the where's 'n when's
and make sure there's a stash of unmentionables on standby
so I can get in the right frame of mind
as befits a man of the press at such an occassion
of soundual splendid texty whatsathingy,
where the air is usually thick with rants from the great
right through to the giftless of our too few true poetic community.

Doin' it this way youse ole cocksmen and women
at the helm of the next generation,
means we can mix up the writin'.
Not that I'm sayin' your lot's stuff's ever stale
old town ''n new place mates 'n muckers,
no way.
In my humble opinion your life in words represent
the rocktastic tip top nexus of linguistivally innovative
lyrical investigative journalistic bio
which is unafraid to say what it thinks
and offers the discerning reader a real insight into your brains,
in a clicheless non limp style
which is bursting at the brim with the spark 'n fire
betraying an eyefull of the forge
from where the language of the truly gifted emerges,
which leads me to believe,
my sock cooking mothers,
that you have been annointed by the lingo god of cool taste in all matters chat.

[Cathy]

A bittersweet poem