I'd been working on this poem again just last week that I read at the last Southie Slam- a sort of Dear John to poetry, some of it poking fun at the same themes that recur in my work over and over again, one of which is metaphors about water:
Dear Poetry:
I can’t write poems anymore. It’s over. This is my
Dear John to poetry; my retirement party. I
was just visiting anyway— once Spicer and O’Hara
left the party just kind of dwindled.
Sure, Alexie may have rekindled
the fire, but the kind of tears-in-your-eyes
elegies to every day and moment was gone
at the bottom of the last bottle of brandy. Forget about me—
burn these notes like those fingertips and piano keys
are matches and flint, the glint of light on white
ivory being so many dominoes on a rickety
table. I miss you, Poetry. Por favor leave my belongings
at the door.
I’d like Flathead Lake back— please return it to me
in empty-milk-gallon installments; if you use Bacardi
bottles or old plastic jugs of Cossack vodka I may be
tempted in the night, during my third trip to the bathroom
to swill down a gulp of my father’s ashes and mountain run-
off if you return it improperly. Before you even ask, I’ll
rescind the sky. No more melodic comparisons
between paint drips or jet-plane jet-wash. No more musing on
the glittering of the ground looking like an end table
in a high-end strip club where the ice in glasses pays
too much for a lap dance from the neon lights, says
“I think she really liked me,” and then melts
and melts again. You can keep any references
to powder and pigment turning to liquid— sand
to ocean; comparisons between Rothko and the sea;
and religion— save for heroin— I have a series
planned for the roads of South Boston likened to veins
and arteries:
Dorchester Heights’ white peak; a needle— Pleasure Bay;
a spoon beneath a lighter.
Poetry, you can keep my failed attempts at drug deals; my time confined
to psych wards. No one lays claim to Picasso. If I see a woman
rollerblading, she’s mine. If I see her later in the car—
still mine. If I go to sleep and wake up and her silhouette
looks like my coffee cup— stem and all— she’s yours.
In the interest of time, the following applies:
1) I give you wars
2) True, I should relinquish blue to you, but Cockroft already laid claim to it; as has M.L. Smoker. Luckily for all of us, Picasso’s already dead.
Yes, Poetry, I know Picasso never really died.
3) I would like to keep the seagulls,
4) Rothko’s show at the Whitney;
5) Rum— you can keep.
6) My failed attempts at fiction are yours, including:
a. The man who goes cross-eyed from never lifting the toilet seat
b. Mr. Valentine’s Day
c. An essay on the new Democracy and the hopelessness of voting and the power of consumer choice
Poetry, you can have reality T.V, and self-help manuals, I’m keeping
the hair gel— pomade, mouse, and creams apply.
Poetry, you can keep my attempts at melodrama— my mining autobiography:
1) Deaths in the family
2) Confessions
3) Drunken escapades
4) Shame
5) Fear— see
a. airplane rides
Poetry, you can keep the following metaphors:
1) The ocean and the sky are lovers; the horizon is a bed; they are a Mark Rothko; they are a misunderstanding.
2) Hemingway as a metaphor for false advertising.
3) Baseball— see America.
4) Drinking as a love affair.
Poetry, girls with sunglasses and headphones walking Castle Island apply.
Poetry, you can keep the following comparisons:
Anything to:
1) de Kooning
2) Pollock
3) Rothko
4) Rosenquist
5) O’Keefe
Poetry, before we break, can you write my artist’s statement for me?
**********************************
And then I got an email forward from my friend Michelle, leading me to an article from The Onion. I guess I am not the first poet to talk about water?
In other news, it is raining at Midway today.
And, yes, the above poem is still in draft. It needs some work.
Thanks Michelle:
Dear Poetry:
I can’t write poems anymore. It’s over. This is my
Dear John to poetry; my retirement party. I
was just visiting anyway— once Spicer and O’Hara
left the party just kind of dwindled.
Sure, Alexie may have rekindled
the fire, but the kind of tears-in-your-eyes
elegies to every day and moment was gone
at the bottom of the last bottle of brandy. Forget about me—
burn these notes like those fingertips and piano keys
are matches and flint, the glint of light on white
ivory being so many dominoes on a rickety
table. I miss you, Poetry. Por favor leave my belongings
at the door.
I’d like Flathead Lake back— please return it to me
in empty-milk-gallon installments; if you use Bacardi
bottles or old plastic jugs of Cossack vodka I may be
tempted in the night, during my third trip to the bathroom
to swill down a gulp of my father’s ashes and mountain run-
off if you return it improperly. Before you even ask, I’ll
rescind the sky. No more melodic comparisons
between paint drips or jet-plane jet-wash. No more musing on
the glittering of the ground looking like an end table
in a high-end strip club where the ice in glasses pays
too much for a lap dance from the neon lights, says
“I think she really liked me,” and then melts
and melts again. You can keep any references
to powder and pigment turning to liquid— sand
to ocean; comparisons between Rothko and the sea;
and religion— save for heroin— I have a series
planned for the roads of South Boston likened to veins
and arteries:
Dorchester Heights’ white peak; a needle— Pleasure Bay;
a spoon beneath a lighter.
Poetry, you can keep my failed attempts at drug deals; my time confined
to psych wards. No one lays claim to Picasso. If I see a woman
rollerblading, she’s mine. If I see her later in the car—
still mine. If I go to sleep and wake up and her silhouette
looks like my coffee cup— stem and all— she’s yours.
In the interest of time, the following applies:
1) I give you wars
2) True, I should relinquish blue to you, but Cockroft already laid claim to it; as has M.L. Smoker. Luckily for all of us, Picasso’s already dead.
Yes, Poetry, I know Picasso never really died.
3) I would like to keep the seagulls,
4) Rothko’s show at the Whitney;
5) Rum— you can keep.
6) My failed attempts at fiction are yours, including:
a. The man who goes cross-eyed from never lifting the toilet seat
b. Mr. Valentine’s Day
c. An essay on the new Democracy and the hopelessness of voting and the power of consumer choice
Poetry, you can have reality T.V, and self-help manuals, I’m keeping
the hair gel— pomade, mouse, and creams apply.
Poetry, you can keep my attempts at melodrama— my mining autobiography:
1) Deaths in the family
2) Confessions
3) Drunken escapades
4) Shame
5) Fear— see
a. airplane rides
Poetry, you can keep the following metaphors:
1) The ocean and the sky are lovers; the horizon is a bed; they are a Mark Rothko; they are a misunderstanding.
2) Hemingway as a metaphor for false advertising.
3) Baseball— see America.
4) Drinking as a love affair.
Poetry, girls with sunglasses and headphones walking Castle Island apply.
Poetry, you can keep the following comparisons:
Anything to:
1) de Kooning
2) Pollock
3) Rothko
4) Rosenquist
5) O’Keefe
Poetry, before we break, can you write my artist’s statement for me?
**********************************
And then I got an email forward from my friend Michelle, leading me to an article from The Onion. I guess I am not the first poet to talk about water?
In other news, it is raining at Midway today.
And, yes, the above poem is still in draft. It needs some work.
Thanks Michelle:
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