the great tree from obscuring fog arose - a sonnet

The great tree from obscuring fog arose,
majestic king of all the gardens near,
its aged branches splayed in prideful pose
in all the land there was no finer peer.

On nearby hill, in weathered manse, there sits
a Lady bloom'd in vibrant vanity
in beaded gowns her ample form just fits
due to a ribbed cage of necessity.

Tree and Mistress both of refined comport,
ones roots strangle, the others air compact,
for beauty's sake do natural form contort.
A grim and harmful unspoken contract.

Tree shrivels, Lady falls, and justice done
for aesthetics have ne'er survival won.

This Friday Flash was brought to you in the Shakespearean mode. I understand I bent the hell out of the iambic pentameter, but I haven't written one of these in close to 7 years. I think for that, I did pretty well. Okay enough for today, I suppose.

Again, found in my inbox

[ was an attempt at a spoken piece, should I ever find time/ability to do slam poetry. not good, but I'm throwing it up anyway ]

UGLY

I am so sick of apathy.

I'm sick of going through my day seeing people going through their day
Not a care in the world aside from their own little worlds.
The blinders are on. The haze is in place.

We have no response as a people anymore.

You can try to talk to them,
To tell them about the world and all the things I see in it
The good which is oh so good and pure and full of potential.
The bad which is hateful and bigoted and destructive.

And the ugly.

Oh the ugly.

I try to tell them, without really telling them, that they're ugly.

That's right, I said it. Ugly. UG-LY. Like a wet sound in your throat when you want to throw up but can't and you just spit bile instead. And I know that sounds gross but I'm talking about something that's pretty gross. Actually, it's more than gross.

It's ugly.

Every person who cares more about American Idol than the president election.

Every person who cares about Britney Spears more than they care about war. Not just this one, but any war we may end up fighting.

People who spend all their time trying to escape the big scary world by hiding in their holes crouched down with their TVs and their friends and they're fun and they're families and their entertainment.

Until the world looks too big and fearful. So they hide even harder.

It's ugly.

And the other side is just as ugly.

Those people who float around saying that they're better because they read big books and volunteer to help lost animals and know what they've read in the paper over their health-conscious vegan bacon. Those people who claim to care about the suffering of the world but have never ever had to worry about going hungry or not having power or clean water or living a life where you fear that the people around you could kill you at any moment without anyone really lifting a finger.

To them, the world doesn't have problems. Instead, it's full of issues to support.

To be trendy.

The root of pretension is pretense. Falsehood. And these people are so full of themselves and their pet projects that they wouldn't know truth if it came up and slapped them. Most likely because their faces are numb from smiling so much.

It's ugly.

But what can you do? So many people hiding behind their lies or their noise, so many people either cowering in fear or pretending to help to kill their guilt. \
And nothing gets done.
People suffer.
People die.
And everyone goes on as if it doesn't matter so long as it doesn't matter to them.

Well, it matters. And that people can so willingly turn away from so many things that need attention and action is the really horrifying thing about us.

No, not horrifying.

Twisted.

Sick.

Ugly.

A Lesson of What I'm Capable Of

So, to set the scene, I'm sitting at work this morning with little to do and very bored. But who was online but my good friend Tony? The conversation went thusly:

Me: I'm bored. /headdesk
Tony: So do something.
Tony: Write a sonnet.
Me: You serious?
Tony: First thing that popped into my head.

Half an hour latter, voila!

A cup that sits upon an empty chair
Filled up with something vaporous and clear
And coming 'pon it with nary a care
I lift the glass and toast devoid of fear.
A toast to those I knew ten years ago
Who scattered on the sund'ring winds of fate
I search for words both curt and apropros
As love comes easier wrapped in masking hate.
A toast to those who come new to my life
Potential souls with which to cast anew
And should our easy bracing turn to strife
A quick well met calls for a quick adieu.
And with a glance to every empty place
I drink, may those who knew me find some grace.

What I Learned With One Night of Poetry

I've always been kind of skeptical of poetry. It's the ghetto-slum of writing to a guy like me. I like books full of people doing and saying things. Rambling about feelings of picturesque pastorals doesn't appeal to me. Exploring the complex workings of your psyche takes more than blank verse in my world. I've always liked my poetry like I like my zombie movies: epic, with lots of people doing deeds both nefarious and noble, never faltering to go forth to fight and fornicate ( and as an aisde, we're looking at a x12 alliteration score there, hypar combo!!1 )

But I've known that I was wrong. I mean, I disliked the pretention and 'high art' of poetry that was touted as the word-usage for 'enlightened people'. Screw that elitism. I just hate that shit. But I knew that wasn't the whole story. I knew that out there was a place where poetry was different and options were available and people threw themselves at the poets work with a kind of sick abandon that was part counter culture and part pacifistic revolution and part near-religious zeal.

So when I heard about Omaha having a poetry slam scene, I was instantly intrigued.

I'll admit, part of me was expecting crappenstance (that curious mix of the mediocre and random or crap and happenstance). And I was certain that it was going to be a bunch of tree-hugging hippies speaking about terrible metaphors they only half understood. It was going to be Moreen's one night engagement at the eleventh street lot. Ridiculous. Terrible. Frustrating.

But that wasn't the case. I wandered into the Omaha Healing Arts Center and smelled patchoulli for the first time (and despite what Angela said about it being hippy stink, I thought it smelled very good) and I had a drink that contained plant ingredients I couldn't recognize that was hot in that insidious way plant matter gets but was nourishing in a way I had forgotten liquid could be. I talked to some people about the show before hand, and then went and sat down.

This evening, I saw the best explanation of pirates vs. ninjas I have ever heard, a metre-perfect shakespearian sonnet to calculus delivered by a girl in a shirt with hex codes on it, poems of love like I hadn't expected, a well-written feminist rant, a crazy Kung Fu piece about Mushuu Beef fighting Lo Mein and Plum Wine that brought the entire house down, a Maori haka (if you don't know, look it up, those things are absolutely spell-binding), and more.

And when I listened to these people get up and speak their speeches and talk about what they had to say, I remembered something. I remembered that words still have power. That what we say and how we say them matter. That words are the most powerful and dangerous tool we have in our arsenal as thinking, living, loving and breathing humans.

And I realized that somewhere along the way I had forgotten that.

HELL NO! I can hear someone saying that now. Probably me. I don't have people who have that much faith in me in my life. 'You have more faith in words than anyone I've ever met,' someone might say. Or I hope they'd say. But I realized that while I used to think that, somewhere along the way I had forgotten it.

I've been writing books and dealing with ideas and concepts and theory and practice and work so much that ... I lost sight of the bigger (or smaller) picture. In the end, what I'm doing isn't just writing, it's a validation of hte power of words. I could easily write a movie, or a song, or paint a picture, or a bunch of other things. But instead I write words. I make stories. I create and I put it out there using the language that you and I think in and speak in and read in every day. Words words words, the world is words and I tap into that most primal part of us. The part that filters everything through words.

For a while now I've been opposed to poet-thought. That being defined as seeing the words as more important than the content. But that was short-sighted. What I had forgotten was that there were poets who were fucking poets. They put words together for the best effect. They aim to inspire and wound and hurt and heal and live and die and a thousand other things. They are brave and frightened and love every minute, even when they don't. They are full of fun and joy.

And that's what I've been missing. Fun and joy. I've been so wrapped up in the steps to achieve success as a writer that I've been unable to see the real issues here. We do it because we love it. If we're not having fun, then why bother? If I can't love my writing and work on it with passion and joy and all those other things, then why bother? It's not worth it. Better to do nothing than to waste it all so pointlessly.

I've lost my way again. And my complete angst over the past week has just been a symptom of that.

Tony and Ange were right, in their own way, but they weren't communicating the issue correctly because I don't think they understood the problem specifically enough. My goals aren't completely unreasonable and the demands I make on myself aren't impossible. But I can't do it like I've been doing it. It's a job, but it's also got to be a dream and a passion and a life.

I need to rediscover my love for the words. I need to recapture that joy. I need to remember that poetry has a place in prose. That poet-thought and author-thought aren't opposites, they complement each other, and I should take from it and use it and learn from it. If not, what am I? Just a writer who doesn't truly love being a writer. And that man is not who I want to be.

So I'm reassessing. Continuing my mission, but on different terms. I will hold as true to my purpose as I can, but if the timeframe slips a little then it slips. I can't keep forcing untruth into myself. I'm starting to feel it and react to it.

It's time to refind truth. It's time to refind emotion. It's time to refind the words.

So thank you, poetry and poets. You've made an angry, disillusioned fool into a more open, accepting fool.

I can't wait to hear you all again, and maybe even join in.

PS: For anyone who's interested, poetry slams and open mics happen all across the omaha metro area (and Lincoln) on a regular basis. Anyone who cares to see what it's like should check out poetrymenu.com. I will likely be at the Om Center next month for this monthly slam, but there are other options as well. Go and watch and enjoy. The donation suggestion is small and the crowd is good and the poetry's entertaining. Who knows? Maybe you'll be inspired, too.