before

i.
before now, when lemon tasting was the thing
that short teachers with large hair dedicated to
creativity,
used to wake us up

that is what woke me up

ii.
now the lemon wakes me still, in the Rockies of Colorado
a bright limn of rose and lemon rind 7,652 paces closer to stars
the first hint of light brings up the point
that we are cradled by rock mothers
whose shoulders are taller than any ever
held me other than skybirds

they are drawing us around, these stars,
and the mountain arms, pulse of starbeings hidden in october snow
from the land of neversummer glaciers, a landscape with
kinship to the moon, where marmots whinny and pica scamper
above the thrillion elk bugling in praise

binocularless, on the ledge of wind, ground iced in mounds

iii.
she handed out a plate of lemon slices and it was passed
hand to hand
across the too-many square desks with plastic chairs attached in long rows
(California schools after Prop 13)
she handed out the plate of lemon slices and read us a poem,

forgotten now. she prepared us, woke us up to pay attention

we each had a lemon slice on our 2x2 plastic fakewood desk top

like a mountain, as sunrise, light itself, she woke me up
to pay attention: healing touch, savor, bugle, flavor, lemon
and today, more than thirty years later, more than
15,000 turns of the earth round the sun
what i remember is biting into the lemon

a galaxy opened within me
my mouth, a portalway
my tongue, a dragon waking
my mind, the canvas of creation

mrs. woolf and her lemon slice woke me
i have been awake since
stalking the night and the day


perhaps it's the sun's fire we sense
in the moments when the mountains turn us over
to day, that flash of pink and lemon
the creative fire, each day, a bite of lemon
waking us up waking me up waking me up


iv.
waking me up to mother mountains of the world this morning,
the 15,828th day of lemon-tasting earthrising brightness



v.
pink dosey doe's with bright and a hit of the blue that beacons night transition
and summons day. the mountain mothers of the world roll us over
in our slumbering, a gentle touch
showing the way

the mountain mothers of the world
roll us over
in our slumbering, a gentle touch
showing the way

vi.
raven who likes shiny objects draws the pink light in her beak
smearing it like a thin jelly across the mother mountains' shoulders
singing wolf lets loose the nightsong turned morning
lone pine in a party lets loose the arms that will embrace the new light
a splendor arises
a splendor arises
mountain chickadees croon lemon rinds from stars and snow
mountain mothers of the world gently turn us over from our slumbering
plucking brightness from snowhair, creating daysong, and light

vii.
mrs. wolf struts with creative purpose in 3 inch heels and a bouffant
that might bring her to five feet - composed, filled with verve, her generative power
that sparked world history

she gave me Byzantium, ancient history,
lemons
and the wakefulness that births poems

viii.
the mountains swoop up light in long tree cloaks
hiding the glowing coals of day in boulder dens
so that marmot and pica and elk and human
can remember their home the stars the earth

ix.
tangy, bitter, cold
every poem since a pang
a wake up call
a slice
of lemon



Scooter Cascadia
Visiting Rocky Mountain National Park
16 October 2010
rev. 21 October 2010

Tante Martha

After my great aunt wouldn't stay dead
we'd find her in the oddest places:
back of the toolshed weeping unconsolably
or shuffling into the bedroom at two a.m.
disoriented, half asleep,
breath vapor fogging the cold blue windows.

"Tante Martha," I pleaded, "tell me what's wrong."
"It's not how they advertised it.
It's all overrated."
"What is?" I asked. "What?"
"Death, you dummy.
Death."

snow angels

it always begins with place now
the soft light of morning through the steam of my tea
or how whirling flings of a hundred starlings
undulate as one being, lifting from a sugar maple
flashing a dark breaker of wings against autumn's crimson,
both particle and wave.

looking backwards it is comical and horrifying
how it always began with me then
usually the middle and the end as well.
in particular there was that shout of a poem
four long columns on purple paper
asserting in the first line 'i am an amazon!'
like a raucous caricature of what i hoped to become
which i could not yet embody with quiet elegance.

i proudly photocopied that piece
and stomped around town taping it up anonymously
hoping to pique the curiosity of the world,
quite oblivious to the wind dried salt on her seaswim hair
or how the ocean crashing
was as loud as anything on the street
if you listened with the right frequency.

embarrassment eases into relief
that i have grown more into the fabric of things,
am on the inside looking into, pointing out
rather than coaxing eyes to look my way.
now it is all about
the bold silver of jupiter playing consort to the moon
or how the glinting red efts come sinuous walking
suddenly everywhere after the rains come.

i can just say thank you to that 20 year old self
for shaking the snow globe reeling
so that it could all come gently to a blanketing rest
and pile up to insulate the house of me.

so that now i can crunch out in the full moon winter
crying out in wonder
at the sparkling white bed of mystery
laid out for our angel wings.

You Walrus Hurt The One You Love

December on Long Island

Wrapped in an afghan that outlived grandma,
you lie on the couch and mumble
that the tree’s leaning to the left
as we jam it in the stand.

Dad, cursing, denies it’s crooked,
until he steps back and informs us of this fact
as if you’d never said a word.

Then he returns to the truck,
leaving melting footprints on the rug.

Mom brings in some ornaments
and also abandons the scene.

The doctors agree that you shouldn’t be here for Christmas.

You should get to the clinic, the program,
the euphemism, immediately.

“Aspirated vomit. Sedate and restrain.”
You should never have been discharged without a plan.

Dad says it sounds like a country club.

Mom says whatever it takes.

I say as little as possible
and let you direct the routine.

“Hang that little soldier on the left.”

“Are there more of those gold bells?”

“That’s good. I’m feeling minimalist this year.”

You spent Advent with a ventilator in your throat
while storms swept through like grim adolescent moods,
sleet, hail, snow, rain, and random days of clarity.
Now you sit there, watch movies, and wheeze.

I plug in the Christmas lights,
although I put no stock in Christ.

You stumbled through the sliding doors,
screaming of hell and slavery,
swinging wildly at nurses and orderlies…

three days before we found you in ICU
with its blinking red and white lights.

Do you even know who dropped you at the hospital?

I stand on my chair and adjust the star.

I ask what’s next
and you know I don’t mean the tree.

We hear Mom chopping something in the kitchen,
Dad grunting as he shovels snow.

“I don’t know. I’m skeptical.”

The fire sputters in the grate.

“I only recognize one higher power,
and it’s kind of hard to surrender to the weather.”

We gaze out the window,
where reindeer graze on a neighbor’s lawn.

You sip some broth and cough.

Then your head lolls on its haphazard pile of pillows,
so I darken the room and doubtfully listen to you breathe.

Outside, as the sun goes down, the wind picks up.

Something from Before

A poetry mentor I had took the class out of the classroom and walked us around outside, pointing at sculptures, people going by, trees, empty benches -- inviting us to sense deeply into these things, find new truths there, or make up stories, and put what we found into poems. That left an impression on me, and leads me toward prompts that involve a physical doing, an assignment, a mission, so that the poem ripples from things moving both inside and outside the mind. 

This week, find something you wrote before. 

"Find" could mean digging something out of storage, taking something off the bookshelf, or calling a relative to see if they can send it to you.

"Something" could mean a page from an old notebook, a poem you published, part of a letter -- but certainly a sample of creative writing and not, say, an old shopping list.

"Before" could mean a week ago, years past, or circa 1979.


Use that piece of writing as the basis for a new poem. There are many ways to go with this. You could quote yourself whole-cloth and then write "part two." You might interweave old lines with new ones. You might refer to the old writing without quoting it. You could take the seed of the idea for the old piece and use it to grow something brand new without ever looking back. You might write about the self who wrote the past sample....

Knowing us, the new poems are going to be ... beyond words...


LABEL: Before


Related: http://www.zefrank.com/youngmenowme/
Childhood photos are recreated by the adults those children became.