Sticking to the Point

Poetry Thursday #20

CESAREAN

The surgeon with his unapologetic

blade parted darkness, revealing

day. Then from her large clay

he drew toward his masked face my small clay. The clatter,

the white light, the vast freedom

were terrible. Outside in, oh, inside

out, and why did everybody shout?

-Otherwise: new and selected poems by Jane Kenyon

edited to add: having a c-section was a defining moment for me. there are so many things that can happen statistically speaking. 10% of all c-sections (and other abdominal surgery patients), will have complications related to the surgery. i was one of those 10%. my condition (ileus) wasn't even that serious compared to other possibilities (blood transfusion, kidney failure and more). i've heard women effuse about c-sections and i'm like dude flippant little twit, it's surgery.

Poetry Thursday #19

Delia posted a poem by Jane Kenyon, that struck a chord with me. Her words, the way they played on my tongue in whispered cadence, boomed large in my psyche and I cried as I read her words. And when I placed my next order with Amazon, I made sure to include a collection by Jane Kenyon, which arrived last night.

THE SHIRT

The shirt touches his neck

and smoothes over his back.

It slides down his sides.

It even goes down below his belt -

down into his pants.

Lucky shirt.

A Poem

After 37 Years My Mother Apologizes for My Childhood

When you tilt toward me, arms out

like someone trying to walk through a fire,

when you swayed toward me, crying out you were

sorry for what you had done to me, your

eyes filling with terrible liquid like

balls of mercury from a broken thermometer

skidding on the floor, when you quietly screamed

Where else could I turn? Who else did I have?, the

chopped crockery of your hands swinging toward me, the

water cracking from your eyes like moisture from

stones under heavy pressure, I could not

see what I would do with the rest of my life.

The sky seemed to be splintering like a window

someone is bursting in to or out of, your

tiny face glittered as if with

shattered crystal, with true regret, the

regret of the body. I could not see what my

days would be with you sorry, with

you wishing you had not done it, the

sky falling around me, its shards

glistening in my eyes, your old soft

body fallen against me in horror I

took you in my arms, I said It's all alright,

don't cry, it's all alright, the air filled with

flying glass, I hardly knew what I

said or who I would be now that I had forgiven you.

-Sharon Olds, The Gold Cell.

Poetry Thursday

This morning I was looking for a poem for my sister and instead, I found two poems for me. Perhaps because it's my birthday month, these poems (this week and next) about mothers spoke to me. What does the poem say to you?

Why My Mother Made Me

Maybe I am what she always wanted,

my father as a woman,

maybe I am what she wanted to be

when she first saw him, tall and smart,

standing there in the college yard with the

hard male light of 1937

shining on his black hair. She wanted that 

power. She wanted that size. She pulled and

pulled through him as if he were dark

bourbon taffy, she pulled and pulled and

through his body until she pulled me out,

rubbery and gleaming, her life after her life.

Maybe I am the way I am

because she wanted exactly that,

wanted there to be a woman

a lot like her, but who would not hold back, so she

pressed herself hard against him,

pressed and pressed the clear soft

ball of herself like a stick of beaten cream

against his stained sour steel grater

until I came out the other side of his body,

a big woman, stained, sour, sharp,

but with milk at the center of my nature.

I lie here now as I once lay

in the crook of her arm, her creature,

and I feel her looking down into me the way the

maker of a sword gazes at his face in the

steel of the blade.

-Sharon Olds, The Gold Cell

Poetry Thursday - A Personal History of my Stupidity

Traffic was heavy coming off the bridge

and I took the road to the right, the wrong one,

and I got stuck in the car for hours.

Most nights I rushed out into the evening

without paying attention to the trees,

whose names I didn't know,

or the birds, which flew heedlessly on.

I couldn't relinquish my desires

or accept them, and so I strolled along

like a tiger that wanted to spring,

but was still afraid of the wildness within.

The iron bars seemed invisible to others,

but I carried a cage around inside me.

I cared too much what other people thought

and made remarks I shouldn't have made.

I was silent when I should have spoken.

Forgive me, philosophers,

I read the Stoics but never understood them.

I felt that I was living the wrong life,

spiritually speaking,

while halfway around the world

thousands of people were being slaughtered,

some of them by my  countrymen.

So I walked on - distracted, lost in thought -

and forgot to attend to those who suffered

far away, nearby.

Forgive me faith, for never having any.

I did not believe in God,

who eluded me.

-Edward Hirsch

Poetry Thursday: Name that tune

The prompt this week was music and Liz Elayne mentioned this song, playing in her head.  Immediately the song lyrics I've used for this week's prompt came to mind as I was trying to figure out WTF this thing is pictured below. Butterfly? Weird pre-historic creature? Can someone please tell me what this is, and can you guess the song?

1st photo is second day of being on my door and the 2nd photo is day 3.

(bits of) my creation -- is it real?

It's my creation  -- i do not know

No hesitation -- no heart of gold

Just flesh and blood -- i do not know

From my heart and from my head

Why don't people understand

My intentions.........

Poetry Thursday # 14

crazy hair day @ camp, 7.18.06

I'd give all wealth that years have piled,

The slow results of life's decay,

To be once more a little child

For one bright summer-day.

-Lewis Carroll