 |
This year I dug through my files and dusted off things I'd put away and forgotten. The poems I posted got older and dustier as the month progressed. I did write a few new drafts as a direct result, but so far have kept them to myself. That's a good thing. This news is esoteric and personal and may be of little interest, but for me it was helpful to confront the juvenilia, remember it, wonder about it. Below is the oldest yet, and fittingly concerns dust--I looked for something imitative of Doctor Williams for this last day of April, in regards to Adina, Tim, Nate, Eve, Jen, Rich, and Blaine's wonderful offerings, and will also point you to the late Kenneth Koch's affectionate and funny take on This is Just to Say. That WCW poem I imagine has inspired countless love notes, and confounded just as many middle schoolers. It did both for me. It's well loved. I thoroughly enjoyed reading everyone's work too, this month, and will look forward to April 2009.
xo,
e
___
Self-Portrait as a Dog, part 2
Everything
is covered
in dog hair and
dust. The hair is white
or yellow, fairly short.
Helix.
Not curled, but
shaped like Yeats’
view of history.
In the morning it cakes
up my
nose. I chew
hair in my sleep.
The dust chokes me, whom-
ever I bring here. Melts
kidneys
to bowels.
Doesn’t matter
how often I wax
or cloth things down, wipe them
off. Tree
leaves scraping
windows complete
the house with spiders.
They eat dust the trees shed
and what
falls off my
face, head, and hands.
Spiders sometimes eat
the dust off my body
before
turning dust,
before it has
become part of all
the things in this room, this
house, this
neighborhood,
this part of town.
The dust here is five
billion years old. Older.
|
|
|
|
|
