Monday, May 21, 2007
Fog rising off the pond up to my room
where bunnies and I greet the morning light
the goose babies have not been seen for days
and might have found some trouble, or found flight
(stop it stop the rhyming stop it now!)
(I even yell at myself in IP)
we’re talking about gravy and the rab-
bit gets a little scared and hops away.
I really think the bunnies always fear
that we’ll be eating them eventually.
I wonder if it’s cruel for predators
to give a home to animals of prey.
(I am still fucking rhyming make it stop!)
the cherry tree that weeps outside my room
does not obscure my view as it does Dave’s
in his office that’s right next door to mine
and does not have a rabbit, but the dogs
do come to visit him from time to time.
(Now really now this rhyming thing must stop
let’s get that said, and then just move along
this is a blank verse challenge it is not
a lame attempt to write a country song)
(I can not stop it can not I can not)
The low fog, creeping, steps among the trees
to spread its darkness and obscure a cat
intent on killing chipmunks and to please
her person when she leaves them on the mat.
It seems to me I’ve hit a blank verse wall
when everything I write sounds cute, not real
I’ve let myself go sing-song is the thing
my challenge now—to keep my blank verse bleak
so end stopped lines must go I must enjamb
most every line, and for god’s sake not rhyme
as though I were in high school trying to show
a teacher that I know what rhyming means,
with no regards for use or quality
I’m not opposed to rhyme I only hate
when it seems to be there because it’s there
with not regard for impact or for craft
but cuz the form demands it or because
the poem is crap. That is the problem here.
Sonnet on How My Husband is Making Me Fat, Wherein I Randomly Change Rhyme Scheme Mid-Poem for No Reason Whatsoever, but Decide to Leave it because, Hell, this is just Practice and Hell, the Original Rhyme Scheme was Wrong for a Sonnet Anyway.
I look up and gaze down my long driveway
to see a man who’s walking, dressed in grey
it’s just my husband going out to get
the paper in his jammies, sure, but yet
it startles seeing his form in the haze
of fog that’s lifting up and off the pond
and it occurs to me that in my brain
the chemicals don’t know that I am wrong
to startle, only know that I felt fear
and set to work to normalize and keep
homeostasis, try their best to clear
the panic chemicals, and what is cheap
to use in this process is cortisone
which leads to belly fat. So, there you go! ¶ 8:03 AM
