Seeing Is Not

Sight is merely sight, and cannot rise
As high as other senses; it is base,
For all things flow into our open eyes,
Sneaking into the mind via the face.
Although it tries to claim a higher place,
Sight is but sight, and nothing more than so.
It is not all the senses we embrace,
Nor can it claim materially to know
How all the other four would change and grow
Should we explore them too; it cannot be
Sufficient, though we think it so, and though
We, as a metaphor, repeat "I see."
So seeing you is not enough, and I
Would wish you closer than my sight can eye.

Paddy

I oughtn't wonder why my bachelor pad
Has, like itself, gone haywire on me.
It's me that did it; all the things I've had
Are piled up in superfluity,
Books on the floor, and every even place,
Random electronics strewn about
With what might be a half-attractive grace
If there were fewer, but must be, no doubt,
Considered vulgar, given how they lie
Covering the seats, the floor, the table;
And who has done all this? Why, it is I,
Who cause as mess as soon as I am able.
I cannot clean it up, for if I do
I simply will remake it, and worse too.

Bottled

I wonder what I was
Before I was myself;
I wonder if God does
Have high, up on some shelf,
A bottle labeled "me"
A bottle labeled "you"
To pour conveniently
Into a fleshly stew
And simmer 'til they're done
Distilled and concentrated
So each of us is one
And each one has been mated.
I cannot tell; but I
Still wonder by and by.

Bearing

I never did pay very much attention
To anything that didn't interest me.
In that context, of course, I ought to mention
How very few things that turned out to be.
I seek out interest where it can be found,
Hidden away in everything in view;
I see it in the sea, the sky, the ground,
The world around me - most of all in you.
You draw my eyes and mind in equal measure
And make me stop and stare and turn to think;
Contemplating you brings constant pleasure,
Even if you simply sit and blink.
Thank you for being you - for being so
You take my interest and make it grow.

Post

The empty letterbox across from me
Suggests, by signage, it has been so long;
Which makes me wonder if there possibly
Might be old mail in it, which might belong
To some more ancient age, when pens were king,
Men wrote (and women too) not by machine
But with their hands, and mail was everything.
But I, alas, must trust it was wiped clean
Of all such fond debris when last in use,
And therefore all my speculations are
But folly, and the poor result of loose
Ideas, hitched unto a falling star.
And yet I must admit I did not look
So there might yet be mail within the nook.

Block

So many wasted words go skittering
Out of my empty brain, and I am left
A pauper, weeping my own thoughtless theft
As all my former thoughts go twittering
Into the air, to fall, obscenely littering
The ground around me, while I, still bereft,
Plumb every dark crevass and deep-notched cleft
Within my mind to find one glittering
Idea. But I cannot see my way,
And fall, and fall, into my inner void
To be internally wholly destroyed
By emptiness, and nothing left to say.
But space is curved, and as I fall I rise
For lack of thought's itself a new surmise.

Patterns

How different the days are from each other!
How strange the way the sky veers back and forth
From sunny clarity to cloudy smother,
To ponderous black rain, then to some fourth
As yet unknown but still expected state
That may not be predicted from the past;
For in this city time will obfuscate
So only unpredictable things last.
I cannot tell tomorrow from today
In Chicago; therefore I must be glad
That you have left the city, in a way,
Since you're the surety that I have had
Since you departed; if you came again
What could be certain in my knowledge then?

On Sincerity in the Ironic Age

I have done a lot of thinking this past couple of years about sincerity and its role in poetry. Some of this has made it onto the blog in the past. But recently I have had newer thoughts, and I think it worthwhile to put fingers to keys again to try and define it a little.

Poetry must be sincere. That is not to say it must be factual; poems of the fantastic, the imagined, and the unreal have a place, and as I have suggested before, I believe that often the best poetry even about factual things has an element of imagination to it that makes it not entirely factual in the most prosaic sense. But poetry must be sincere; that is, it must engage seriously with its topic, it must care about what it has to say, and it must attempt to do justice to those things.

But wait. I should back up. Poetry should have a topic!

For me, poetry is a paradox. It is the intentional use of (frequent) complexity, (often) difficult language, and (always) stylized form to achieve clarity. That sounds more complex than I mean it, so I will try again: poetry uses complex means to make things simple. I have no love for "poetry" that seeks to be intentionally confusing, obfuscating, or simply amorphous. Poetry, at its best, has something to say, or at least something to talk about, and uses its nature as poetry to make that thing clearer, or at least better understood.

So yes, poetry should have a topic. Poetry should have a point - not a point as in a political message, necessarily, but a point, a reason for existing beyond its own mere narcissism. Ars gratia artis indeed, but art for the sake of what the art is, not art for the sake of merely making art. The point need not be anything major; I write poems to describe the weather, for goodness' sake, and you cannot get much more stereotypically minor. I write poems about writing poems! But there must be a there there.

In turn, I believe this means poetry must take a turn - an intentional, definite turn - towards sincerity and away from the ironic, meta, and post-meta ways of the world we live in. Poetry is (usually) shit when it tries to conform to that sort of thought process; poetry that tries to be post-post-post ends up childlike and silly, in the worst senses. Poetry should strive to be sincere, not necessarily in a stereotyped, "Victorian" sense of pathos, or a self-consciously post-ironic sense of "sincere," but simply sincere, honest, forthright. It is important to care, to be interested in the poem and in its subject, and to strive to put these things together in a meaningful way.

Gentle

Gentleness is surely not a crime,
Yet all too often punished like it were;
Its devotees all end up doing time,
Not in a jail, as honesty'd prefer,
But in others' demands and their good graces,
For what cannot in conscience be refused
Is, to the gentle, like the sweet embraces
Of a padded cell. They are abused
By their own gentle natures, which insist
They must be kind to others, which in turn
Gives them an infinitely endless list
Of duties to perform, until they learn
To roughen up a bit - or else they stay
Imprisoned by themselves in their own way.

Fog

The world is white outside my window, but
I have a feeling that is fiction. Why?
Because of something - I don't quite know what
Which tells me that the same old things are by,
No matter what the color of the sky.
I may not see the buildings over there,
But that which tells me they are gone must lie,
Or else I'd have to think that everywhere
Might vanish like that, and I do not care
To think such things. For she might go as well,
And I'm not brave enough, I think, to dare
To think of that and not think it a hell,
And since I think I am not damned, I know
The white outside's a temporary glow.

Biograph

This is my city now. I can't deny
I love so many other places - but
I know for now at least that this is my
Home. I can still chuckle at the SLUT
While knowing where it goes, or mock the T
For going over bridges slowly - yet
The El and CTA are home to me.
Likewise Seattle may be used to wet,
Cambridge to crazy drivers, Oxford to
A certain isolation - and I miss
Each of these duly, but I muddle through
The wind and cold Chicago can't dismiss
And know it to be mine - although when heat
Conquers, Louisville is my retreat.

Bustime

So many people (I myself am one)
With eyes glued to their screens. I wonder if
They notice I have seen them have their fun,
Or if they'd notice if a minor tiff
Erupted in their faces. Can they see
(As I can when I glance up from my screen)
The tired faces - theirs of certainty
Included - or the passing fields of green
Nourished by the falling sheets of rain
Pressed on the window? I look up, because
I wonder; they look down to dodge the strain
Wondering might bring - at least mine does
For in my wonder I must realize
I too avoid the other riders' eyes.

Pride

When is it proper to be proud of those
Whose glories we have had no hand in making?
When is it proper that we should be taking
Pride in a work we did not do? Who knows.
All that I'm sure of is that I take joy
From watching those I love succeed, no matter
If I'm involved in it; I do not flatter
Myself in them, nor claim I should alloy
Their greatness with my own, but simply smile
And call that happiness that I receive
From their achievements, pride. When I perceive
Such things as make their happiness worthwhile
I am so proud I do not care what name
Is given to that pride, nor yet what blame.

Error

Some things must be unspoken
At least until I'm dead
Or else I shall be broken
At least, within my head;
But none of them are hidden
Or really hard to see
It's just that I, unbidden,
Would know them silently.
My sins and my misgivings
Are such as I would keep
From earning public livings
Lest I should start to weep.
Not from some horror there
But from a sense of care.

Transitory

An hour is an hour anywhere;
At least on Earth, and that is all I've got.
An hour can consume one hour's care,
No more, and that I call a blessed lot,
For when one that I love is far from me
In danger or in some way under stress
I can but worry chronologically
An hour in an hour's harsh duress.
I cannot fret away a year or more
In wondering what their tomorrow brings,
For ere I did, I'd know what was in store:
It would have happened. And that knowledge sings
Within me: I can worry, and I will,
But every hour's but an hour still.

Trips

A planned thing done is like a weight uplifted
That swings a seesaw, which in turn lets roll
A ball, which strikes a can (which had been gifted
With a lit flame, set in the center hole)
Knocking it over, thus igniting oil
Which burns away a piece of thin-tined string,
Which in its turn, by undoing its coil,
Lets gravity once more do its own thing
And drop a penny, which will spin and land
Upon another balance, which lets fly
A feather, which, by floating out of hand
Makes someone sneeze exactly so thereby
A cup's knocked over, and a mouse is caught:
That is, it's just a little overfraught.

Hasty

Anyone would think
I had no time to waste,
That all I do is sink
Into a constant haste.
But all of that is for
A chance to be with you
And not have to do more
Than you would want me to.
I run and hurry on
As quickly as I can
So other things are gone
And I'm alone your man
Then I can slow and be
With you in harmony.

88MPH

There's always something comforting when I'm
By her; as if the hours simply melt away
And I am left unaltered by the time,
Younger than I had been yesterday.
She smiles at me, and I'm a boy again;
She looks away, and still I am a youth,
But aging once again as normal: when
She glances back, I'm free from that harsh truth.
I cannot feel my years, nor do they shine
Out of my face, when she and I are one;
As long as I am certain she is mine,
I feel my heart and sinews new-begun.
So I, when old with her, shall give no tongue
To crabbed complaints, for I shall still feel young.

Tree

There are some things man was not meant
To know. But let's ignore them and pretend
There aren't, and that there's a divine intent
Of knowledge for us. If that's true, then lend
An ear to what I have to say: the past
Is fixed, and I am glad, for it should be
But what's to come is also sure to last
For future touches all eternity
And I am glad to say I think I know
The purpose and the future of my heart
For when I'm close to you I always glow,
And my emotions take another's part.
So if I can know or pretend I do
I know I'll spend my future all with you.

Simple Gifts

Time, which passes by me fitfully
Moved by its own desires, and not mine
Has, I presume, observed a change in me
From its own workings, not from my design.
But I am thankful for it: 'tis benign,
And as I live it makes my life increase
In comfort, joy, and everything that's fine,
Especially the pair of bliss and peace.
The change, which I acquired on Time's lease,
Is my affection, growing every day
Towards you - a love I trust will never cease,
And rather build upon itself this way
Eternally. Time gave it me, but I
Hope 'twill outlast the giver by and by.

NCAA

Sometimes a piece of knowledge really sticks
Inside my mind; some trivia does that.
Like Harvard last in 1946
Was in the NCAA, fell flat
And lost twice in one tournament. But now
That is no longer true. In 2012
We can but lose the once, the rules allow,
And since we can't do worse, and cannot delve
Below a double loss, we might as well
Do better - there's no failure if we lose,
And should we greet the ringing of the bell
With all we have, we could meet Syracuse
(Unlikely that, but still a thought I've had:
After all, they say that March is Mad).

Pi Day

Pollen often looks like snow
Yet even thus I can't pretend
That winter isn't at an end
As sudden summer seems to grow
Out of no spring. The treetops glow
With instant blossoms, and they send
The pollen with which they perpend
Into the wind to breeze and blow
In mockery of winter wiles.
So all about is warm and bright
Students with their summer smiles
Expressing comfort and delight
As nature mutters in her cave
"This brings me to an early grave."

Untimely Spring

The cloudless sky is strange to me, because
It has estranged itself; had it been here
When in its place the grey and cloudy was,
Then we would be acquainted. But now we're
Quite unaccustomed to each other, for
All of my memories since autumn are
Full of the other sort, and I, therefore,
Because those memories are happy, bar
The cloudless sky its former pride of place
Within my heart. Time was my memories
Of you were tinged with sunlight on your face,
But now they have become by slow degrees
Associated with the dark: and so
To have them back, I'd let this sunlight go.

Tradition X

Tradition's only ever an excuse,
Hardly a reason on its own for things;
Of course, it's nice, but too-exclusive use
Implies that to the past a virtue clings
Which cannot be improved, which cannot be;
For if it were, why live? The past is past,
And we can never live but presently
As it converts from futures we once cast.
If nothing but tradition gives the force
For arguments against a change, then change;
Intertia gives all objects a set course,
But never to accelerate is strange.
Do not mistake me though: change too requires
A reason greater than its own desires.

65 and Sunny

The day, like an unlicked bear whelp,
Does not know what it is. Therefore
It strruggles without momma's help
And gives the earliest encore
To spring that I have seen as yet
(And I have sprung, and summered too
And do not lightly, then, forget
How endless winter is to view).
I fear that somewhere Nature lurks
Ready to relick her cub
But for the moment, springtime works
If winter has to have a sub
And I'd be grateful if the lump
Should stay an unlicked, springy rump.

Dropsy

Rain is not, and never was, God's tears
It would be quite poetic if it were,
And every drop, though thousands of wet years
Were holy sorrow, signs of heaven's stir
At earthly troubles. But to so believe
Would be to say the earth, and all that drinks,
Requires God sufficiently to grieve.
For anyone who rationally thinks
About the rain, will see it is required
By all God's creatures; and if so, that God
Would have to cry as much as we desired
In order that the grazers and their sod
Might have their water - which we also need.
Do we need God to cry? That's a harsh creed.

Refreshed

Poems come and poems go
Some are worth retaining here;
Others wander to and fro
Others simply disappear.
If I type a poem clear
In the white space of this page
Would you not believe it queer
If the web should hemorrhage
And contrive to disengage
What I wrote from where 'twas writ,
Leaving me in primal stage
When I had not written it
But with memory thereof
And a writer's selfish love?

Thoughtless

Sometimes a million thoghts flock in my head
Sometimes they don't, and everything is one.
Sometimes I'm happy when that's true instead;
Sometimes I'm lonely when my thinking's done.
Then on occasion I can be morose,
Or even find the things I think obscene;
But if I didn't I'd be comatose
And therefore must keep thinking in between
My thoughts. Therefore more thoughts must come again
And fill the spaces that their brothers filled
So I can live and think. And thinking then
I know myself, and know what I have willed.
The unthought life is not worthless, but void:
My life is in the thoughts I have enjoyed.

Adonaic

There is a garden dangerous to find
In which the flowers grow so gracefully
That men despite all dangers constantly
Troop in vast regiments of every kind
That our Creator by his will designed
To merely catch a scent, or barely see
A tendril or a petal visibly
Snake towards the sun, heliotrope though blind.
And so the way unto this garden's strewn
With bones of men unequal to the task;
For although through the woods there may be hewn
A path, its very presence serves to mask
The danger on it: I, by contrast, flew
Into the garden winged by Love for you.

Petrachan

In the woods there is a clear cool stream
Translucent, pure, and so intoxicating
That those who drink from it begin to dream
Of subjects and desires so titillating
That when they wake they beg to dream again,
Cursing themselves for fools for ever waking,
Cursing the world as one enormous pen
In which they live forever caged, forsaking
Lives, family, and all to dip once more
Into the stream and live forever dreaming.
One day I chanced to find this stream, and pour
Myself a glass of it, crystalline, palely gleaming;
But as I drank I saw your face and knew
I must have dreamt already, to have you.

Spenserian

Two happy hearts with but a single mind
Two minds beknit in perfect harmony
Harmony in choric chords combined
Chords made of notes covalent musically;
A clef denuded, making up a key
Devoid of sharpness, or of flat discord;
Discord avoided so delightfully
It touches all the stops joy can afford,
And gives them breath across this even chord
That every ear may drink the joy therein,
Taking the measure in so it is stored
In memory, free of all hint of din.
So may our love play over every note
In one great harmony to make me dote.

Wyattite

The chase is not the purpose of my hunt;
It is possession, and the present joy
Of having what I sought. I do not front;
No, I am frank: the chase begins to cloy
When that which is pursued flies far ahead
And even the loud braying of the hounds
Falters from hearing. I prefer instead
That which comes after all, and still abounds
When memories of hunting all have faded.
I love to have, not seek, although pursuit
Was not unpleasant. Do not think me jaded
With the chase; I rather seek its root:
The hope to have, rather than pursue
For having got, there is much more to do.

Sidneian

Cupid, finding Europe bare of breasts
Open to his arrows, none of mind
Poetical enough for him, now tests
The other pondside, where he hopes to find
Someone of heart sufficiently aligned
With his, to make his duty soft and light.
Ay me! And I am caught beside his blind,
Allowing him to draw and shoot aright
Despite his often-argued lack of sight
And pierce my heartstrings with a single shot.
Yes, there it is, lodged in me firm and tight,
Before his bowstring could relax from taut.
But I, poor fool, consider this no woe,
But rather joy that he has struck me so.

Timelessnesses

I wonder why I wonder about time
It's always been there, always will be there
No matter how I fall or where I climb
I can't escape or change it anywhere.
So why obsess? Why not accept it so,
Ignore it, or be comfortable therein?
I can but answer that I do not know,
But time is something I have always been
Interested in, and cannot now dismiss
As simply omnipresent and ignored.
I do not know what I will do with this,
Except look at more time and still be bored,
But it's the truth, and truths are timeless, I
Have heard. I'll find that truth out by and by.

Wells

I figure there must be a way
To travel up and down through time
To see again a yesterday
Or reproduce a future clime
To make the end of days come down
And shake hands with the first big bang
To rush a smile to a frown
And back again; to rehearse slang
From ages past, or realize
Over a length of ages hence
The ways that ours will normalize
And laugh, then, at our own expense.
I think there is a way: the mind
Can conjure pasts and futures find.

Recipe

Cheap thrills thrill
Low fun's fun
To stay still
Should be done
Rarely. I
Like this world
And this sky
Both are twirled
'Round a line
Through the pole
This is fine
We can roll
With that. How?
Have fun now!

Ba Bum

Even good times must pass away and die
Into the future; forward lies who knows?
A wasteland into which our purpose grows
Untamed, untended as the fields that lie
Fallow, despite our efforts. We will, by and by,
See what will sprout, but in the random throes
Of germination, that which purpose sows
Is often lost, no matter how we try.
But what we reap need not be bad for good;
There can be benefit in random findings,
As when, despite uncertain trackless windings
We find ourselves arriving where we would
As if by magic. The subconscious brings
Good in the end, even from worser things.

Nothing Can Come Of Nothing

Words don't often fail me; if they did
I'd be in trouble. But sometimes they do.
Sometimes all things go wonky, and get rid
Of what is normal. From my point of view,
And most, I think, this annoying. But
If everything went always by the plan
Never making us go " wait, wait. What?"
Life would be boring. As it is, it can
Be normal, usual, routine, and yet
Just when we think it's all too simple, we
Can see the world seem to at once forget
The ordinary, and grasp fantasy.
The world in which I have no words is one
In which there's something new, and that is fun.

Alternator

Some days seem dark and grey and dreary
Full of things repetitive to see,
Worthless and constantly so weary
That they can sap vitality.
These days have happened frequently
For me in recent months, and so
It is with joy I finally
Observe that feeling turn and go.
I know the day will see some snow,
A full-on cover from the clouds
A bunch of people who will grow
By tedious manners into crowds,
And yet I do not care: the day
Is not depressed, but wild and gay.