a pretty poorly written poem thought of on the car ride away from you

Despite Your Imperfections

And mine;
the seemingly apathetic responces when a game is on,
the ceaselessly unnecessary questions comparing me to her,
the lack of letters written,
the lack of futbol experience,
the lazy moments,
the seamless passive aggressivity.
We like - we really like -
We love each other.
And for some reason,
perhaps the monthly rawing of emotion,
perhaps the miles I was painfully placing between us,
a song on the radio almost made me cry.
Yes, it was a country song.
But accepting the cliche and moving forward,
the last verse desrbied and old man
worn and surrounded by loved ones
who told them happily that
this was his temporary home, it's not
where he belongs - meaning heaven was the goal
and this was just a means to an end.
I hate that and disagree
wholeheartedly.
The worst thought that comes in to my mind
from time to time
is the possibility of losing you, leaving you
forever one day.

Because I feel empty when I leave you for a week.
One of the many reasons I know this thing we share is irreplaceable:
despite all imperfections on your side and mine,
despite any bad nights or moments we pass through
every single thing is better when you're near me.
you make my every day.
you make me.

(jb)

footnote: I have recently realized that you have made me bad at writing poetry. At one point in my life, I could have written ten poems a week, and not it's difficult to write one. And when I write it, it's usually an underwhelming work - and it's all your fault. It's all your fault in the best possible way because i love you so deeply and eternally and in every cliched and irreplaceable and indescribable and unconditional way that when I try to put it into words, it comes out into a blob of romantic, corny gush that sounds just like the last three poems I wrote. So yes, you make me love you too much and for that you have made me a horrible poet. Thank you for ending my writing career. I'm so happy I feel this way.

ted kooser

An Old Photograph

by: Ted Kooser
from: Sure Signs (1980)

This old couple, Nils and Lydia, 

were married for seventy years.

Here they are sixty years old

and already like brother

and sister - small, lustless eyes, 

large ears, the same serious line

to the mouths. After those years

spent together, sharing

the weather of sex, the sour milk

of lost children, barns burning, 

grasshoppers, fevers and silence,

they were beginning to share

their hard looks. How far apart

they sit; not touching at shoulder

or knee, hands clasped in their laps

as if under each pair was a key

to a trunk hidden somewhere, 

full of those lessons one keeps

to himself.

                They had probably

risen at daybreak, and dressed

by the stove, Lydia wearing

black wool with a collar of lace, 

Nils his worn suit. They had driven

to town in the wagon and climbed

to the studio only to make

this stern statement, now veined

like a leaf, that though they looked

just alike they were separate people, 

with separate wishes already

gone stale, a good two feet of space

between them, thirty years to go.

a poem on fighting while miles apart

Nights Like This

It’s nights like this: when all the planets, stars align in perfect symmetry - except that special one and two that would have made it what it needs to be. 

It’s nights like this: when all the sounds of darkness live in wondrous harmony - except that branch, that breeze that moves without a purpose other than to simply throw things off. 

It’s nights like this: when cool and warm meet somewhere on the sea and battle through the silence, stirring up inconsequential waves upon the waters - that are only the beginning of it all. 

It’s nights like this: when air brings forth a certain strange philosophy as smells of wet, salt-covered land brings images to mind that would, on any other night, paint beauty on closed eyelids tight but... 

On nights like this: it all turns to puppetry - and rag dolls ridden with chipped cheeks, the nights air reeks of rotting fish, and every wish/desire seems to tire with the sun - and as it sets, it sets fire to the innocence - clouds who knew nothing of now are turned into a sinning lot as flames envelope life. 

It’s nights like this: when brilliant skies resemble hell and everything, it crumbles, in the resonating silence. The beauty is resilient - and yet everyone is blind. 

And as, on nights like this, the sky turns over and birds quickly swim away into the distance: there is no substance in the truth. It’s night like this: when even the perfect picture has a fault, and I can find it, and the ugly turns unthinkable...It’s nights like this. 

It’s nights like this: I fight with you.

(jb)

a poem speaking to collins

Note: I had an assignment once to write a poem emulating the styles of my favorite poet. I, of course, chose Billy Collins. This is my poem, speaking to him in what I tried to make his same linguistic beauty and simplicity. I love his poetry because it is the sort of thing that doesn't always have some terribly deep and powerful meaning, though sometimes it does, but always is enjoyable to sit, read, let wash over you, and then close and put away. (ps-as with the Hamlet piece, we were to use lines from their poetry, those are what the footnotes are for)

Your Student 
written: December 2, 2004

The figures once in front of me,
Having forgotten the law of gravity, (1)
Drifted, disconnected, across my calculus sheet.
Off to complicate another unhappy student.

You begin whispering
Stitched into your own private coat (2)
A few short steps away,
And because my math has abandoned me
I rummage through my other
Unfinished assignments sitting in their respective jackets
To find a new distraction
From your tempting, quiet calls.

Your lures become increasingly urgent,
Gaining volume and resolve.
You ask me to take a bite of poetry
And decide whether its ingredients agree.
You ask me to walk inside the poem’s room (3)
And feel the wall for a light switch. (3)

But I’m not walking, Billy.

You rise above what any normal
Flawed and maturing person hopes to produce,
Scribbling your perfect, quotable pages
For Bess Hokin, Frederick Bock, Oscar Blumenthal
And Mr. Levinson to applaud
While the rest of us sit
Awed, impressed and stupefied.

You are a paradigm of art.

You are the cat that I’ve wished for since childhood.
And now that I have you
There are few moments that you’re mine.

Leaping to an unreachable limb
In an autumned dogwood outside my window
Just beyond my reach
Only coming down to join me,
Comforting my ankles with your pity
When the rush of wind begins to bore you.

(jb)

1) "Not Touching" from Questions About Angels (1991)
2) "Books" from The Apple that Astonished Paris (1988)
3) "Introduction to Poetry" from Questions About Angels (1991)

billy collins: love

 Love

by: Billy Collins

from: Questions About Angels (1991)

The boy at the far end of the train car
kept looking behind him
as if he were afraid of expecting someone

and then she appeared in the glass door
of the forward car and he rose
and opened the door and let her in

and she entered the car carrying
a large black case
in the unmistakable shape of a cello.

She looked like an angel with a high forehead
and somber eyes and her hair
was tied up behind her neck with a black bow.

And because of all of that,
he seemed a little awkward
in his happiness to see her,

whereas she was simply there,
perfectly existing as a creature
with a soft face who played the cello.

And the reason I am writing this
on the back of a manila envelope
now that they have left the train together

is to tell you that when she turned
to lift the large, delicate cello
onto the overhead rack,

I saw him looking up at her
and what she was doing
the way the eyes of saints are painted

when they are looking up at God
when he is doing something remarkable,
something that identifies him as God.

a flashback poem from a silent literary heroine (jb)

Note to those who don't know Hamlet: This is a creative writing assignment I did years ago that I just came across and really liked. It was to write a couple verses from the perspective of one of the characters in Hamlet (my favorite Shakespeare play) and possibly add some story that isn't a part of the play. I wrote a soliloquy from Ophelia's perspective.  
All you need to know about Ophelia: in the play, she was Laertes' sister and a possible wife of Hamlet. She tends to be an inconsequential character for the most part, which is why I chose to bring her out and tell her story. Hamlet, as we know, goes mad, as does Ophelia, and she dies by "accidentally" falling into the water and drowning. I imagined, therefore, that she did not die by accident but committed suicide because she was pregnant with Hamlet's child and could not tell him or anyone else because of his insanity and inability to act accoringly in her last few days. This in her final speech before going into the water. (The italicized lines are lines from various points in the actual play of Hamlet, used out of context of their place in the work but in aid to my poem so as to connect my work with the original text.)



The Last Soliloquy
(written: February 3, 2005)

My father lies below me in the soil
My brother’s out to seek his dear revenge
My lover is the one he seeks to kill
And I have found my own specific end.
Nature is fine in love, and where ‘tis fine,
It sends some precious instance of itself
After the thing it loves; as at my home
Where photos of you sit upon my shelf.
They wait for dust that soon will start to form
And find a place to spend eternity
As I will find an everlasting bed
Within this water momentarily.
But first a simple prayer I send above
In hopes the heavens let it reach your ears
So you might know the reason for my choice
This night that will erase my coming years.
You told me once that I was in your heart
Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so,
And we fulfilled our romance while I did
As you requested and let no one know.
But I could not ignore when sick set in
And quickly pushed your love for me aside.
Madness in great ones must not unwatched go,
And so I pulled your mother to the side.
I told her of a secret you don’t know
And she replied with quite the scorning speech.
I knew her lack of temperance was a sign
That for us, joy was only out of reach.
And so, after a day of questions asked
And answered in the quiet of my mind,
With all the options factored in an weighed --
This double suicide’s all I could find
To set this great insanity to rest
And let my soul take flight to better things.
My lord, I have remembrances of yours
And one of which is ever lingering.
I pray you do forgive but beg you please:
Do not, as some ungracious pastors do,
Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven
While like some reckless libertine are you.
I feel the wind of death upon my back
And time has come for my composed surrender
Obtain my final words with tender, please,
Let truth be known and all my sins remembered.

(jb)