Thoughts in my head--typed up
I am often thinking that I have typecast myself a grief poet. Or that maybe I just am a grief poet, and should be OK with that. It is, after all, what got me back to writing poetry for the first time in over 20 years. And I wander back and forth between thinking that I should write about other things, and accepting the fact that I write less out of discipline that when something inspires me and I feel I must write it down.
But I admire the 30/30, 365/365 folks and have been hoping to try out some of Rachel's or Scott's writing exercises now that some work writing projects are winding down (I may be fooling myself about that). There have been a few odds & ends percolating for a while that might turn into something nice.
So it seems ironic that the first few lines of this poem bugged me so much today at work that I stopped to write a GRIEF poem (actually I was walking for part of it). I have only felt like I HAD to write at the museum a few times. Obviously those lines refer to the first paragraph above. And maybe there is a place for a pure poet of grief, because loss is certainly everywhere.
Wings (For Anne Marie Marra)
I am not the one to write this poem
I am no angel of grief.
That is the guilty secret of death-
The way I feel so alive.
No place to write a poem that might
Reach across the River Styx.
A poet needs to be closer.
I should have been closer-
Steel myself to creep down that sooty, slippery bank.
If I had wings for sorrow,
I would hunch my shoulders,
Trail feathery tips through brackish water.
If I were an angel,
I would not need a poem.
I would wade out into that sucking silt.
No poem.
My voice a song sent in your direction.
No poem.
My spread wings shaking off black oily tears.
Their brilliance tempting you back home.
But I admire the 30/30, 365/365 folks and have been hoping to try out some of Rachel's or Scott's writing exercises now that some work writing projects are winding down (I may be fooling myself about that). There have been a few odds & ends percolating for a while that might turn into something nice.
So it seems ironic that the first few lines of this poem bugged me so much today at work that I stopped to write a GRIEF poem (actually I was walking for part of it). I have only felt like I HAD to write at the museum a few times. Obviously those lines refer to the first paragraph above. And maybe there is a place for a pure poet of grief, because loss is certainly everywhere.
Wings (For Anne Marie Marra)
I am not the one to write this poem
I am no angel of grief.
That is the guilty secret of death-
The way I feel so alive.
No place to write a poem that might
Reach across the River Styx.
A poet needs to be closer.
I should have been closer-
Steel myself to creep down that sooty, slippery bank.
If I had wings for sorrow,
I would hunch my shoulders,
Trail feathery tips through brackish water.
If I were an angel,
I would not need a poem.
I would wade out into that sucking silt.
No poem.
My voice a song sent in your direction.
No poem.
My spread wings shaking off black oily tears.
Their brilliance tempting you back home.