Tag Archives: Lexington Poetry Month

Day eighteen poem, LexPoMo 2017

LexPoMo2017I found a copy of Mary Oliver’s A Poetry Handbook at the used book store last week. I picked it up this morning and these sentences jumped off the page.
(Found poetry from p. 9)

Reblogged from the Lexington Poetry Month blog.

Beyond the margins of the self

Poetry is a river; many voices travel in it; poem
after poem moves along in the exciting crests and falls of the river
waves. None is timeless; each arrives
in an historical context; almost
everything, in the end, passes. But the desire
to make a poem, and the world’s willingness to receive
it—indeed, the world’s need of it—
these never pass.

Day seventeen poem, LexPoMo 2017

LexPoMo2017I love the library, for more reasons than I can possibly express. While working there today I made a list of intriguing titles as I wandered the stacks. Each line of this poem, including the title, is from that list.

Reblogged from the Lexington Poetry Month blog.

History of the rain

what the waves know
the yellow eyes of crocodiles
exposed
the time between
love and ordinary creatures

hard to handle
the night falling
untethered
into the beautiful north

they may not mean to, but they do
listen to me
a city breathing

secret of a thousand beauties
chasing fire

reckless disregard

Day sixteen poem: LexPoMo 2017

LexPoMo2017This was inspired by a fun photo of Pablo Neruda featured in the June 13 newsletter from Two Sylvias Press. (Click here to see it for yourself.)

Reblogged from the Lexington Poetry Month blog.

Pablo Wears Dice-Colored Glasses

this world is a chancy
dive where the odds are ever
shifting

yuh pays yuh
money and takes
yuh chances

beg for luck
to be a lady and shoot
your wad

let it all ride
on this
 one
  last
   roll

Day fifteen poem: LexPoMo 2017

LexPoMo2017Here’s another poem using the derangement exercise from Wingbeats II. The source poem is the latter portion of “The Pink Locust” by William Carlos Williams. Unfortunately, I could not find an online version of the poem to link to.

Reblogged from the Lexington Poetry Month blog.

Face up

Place me – my denial will rest
among those who but rose
a poet’s galaxy.

I know not if I am it. In what may be
persistence, I flower like so and reward
greater offers.

No life would be ridiculous: which poem
in slighting slights itself? The poet made well
if it equals the rose.

A rose is an answer as might be betrayed
in would-be poems not inclined
to do much.

What says the world facing what the poet in me
will become? Myself, I think what
could I wish I were.

 

Day fourteen poem: LexPoMo 2017

LexPoMo2017Today’s poem resulted from a poetry exercise in Wingbeats II (edited by Scott Wiggerman and David Meischen) using D.H. Lawrence’s poem “Twilight.” (View the original poem here – title discrepancy due to sources – The Complete Poems vs. New Poetry.)

Reblogged from the Lexington Poetry Month blog.

Twilight deranged

gone from day is sight
litter glimmers light

a veil of star, a single play
there forsaken have the children

lie like a waste has meant
day worldly that all by flittering

goes moth-blue moon and night
oozing stock scent

old mirth of children wanes
clamor and pallor in palimpsest

the west dips and swallows
out of earth comes darkness

Day twelve poem, LexPoMo 2017

LexPoMo2017Here’s another poem from an exercise in The Daily Poet. And yes, it really is supposed to be this short.

Reblogged from the Lexington Poetry Month blog.

Opening

Fear knocked on the door, would not stop
until I answered it and Hope flew out.

Day eleven poem, LexPoMo 2017

LexPoMo2017This resulted from a prompt in The Daily Poet by Kelli Russell Agodon and Martha Silano of Two Sylvias Press. The Kindle version comes in handy, especially on a smart phone.

Reblogged from the Lexington Poetry Month blog.

Unresolved

The dream starts with tornadoes,
dozens of them descending
at the same time, all around,
from a sky the color of a faded
black eye. It always begins
like this, a shifting landscape
of rage without refuge or
escape that doesn’t end
until I wake up.

Day ten poem, LexPoMo 2017

LexPoMo2017Sometimes poetry comes to us from unexpected places. This found poem is dedicated to Craig Price, whose voice brings life to so much poetry (and whose words these are).

Reblogged from the Lexington Poetry Month blog.

Apocalypse

Why would anyone sleep
past 6 a.m. ever? I’ll never live
to find out because I have two cats
that act like the four horsemen
are at our door if I’m still asleep
at 5:45.

Days eight and nine poems, LexPoMo 2017

LexPoMo2017Due to technical difficulties I wasn’t able to post yesterday, but the writing happened anyway. Hooray!

And maybe readers prefer less frequent posts of collected poems rather than the daily dose? Please comment below to weigh in on this. And thanks for reading!

At the Kentucky with Audrey and the guys

in the old movie house
with my kids on a summer afternoon
the smell of popcorn, our fingers
sticky as the floor, all the chocolate
gone before echoes of the Wurlitzer’s
final chords die and the lights dim

the celluloid orchestra swells
a foreshadowing medley and then the opera
spills overdressed hothouse flowers
into Covent Garden where native violets
defy mud and rain and a gentleman
is actually revealed by his words
rather than the cadences of his tongue

 

Lunch with the birds

We sit on the sun-warm patio, glasses
dripping condensation beneath the broad canvas
umbrella. Our plates are kaleidoscopes of garden
bounty: arugula, mizuna, mustard, kale; open-face
hummus sandwiches with radishes and parsley; new
potatoes with basil and scallions. Bees bumble
loudly in the potted lavender. We feel a bit
potted ourselves, the pitcher of sangria
nearly empty, much like the thistle feeder
in the perennial bed, where goldfinches
flash in shrill quarrel over the lowest ports.

Day seven poem, LexPoMo 2017

LexPoMo2017I came home from a meeting to find the kids had been playing Boggle. I decided to see what I could do with the words on their score sheets. It isn’t poetry for the ages, but it was interesting.

Reblogged from the Lexington Poetry Month blog.

Boggled

met the muse
foe not poet
tied pet pit
pen tint tins
penny

coy boy toy
oboe hot cove
timed times ten
meme beam vain
froth

sun fun run
tow pew pub
wet pave heat
den swept
neat