Sometimes it seems that my poeems are better read out loud than in print. I get really powerful reactions from folks* when I read them. I haven’t managed to school myself in that freaky stilted sort of ‘slam poetry’ style** that ‘professional poets’ seem to favor, so when I read, I just read from my heart as if I actually MEAN what I am saying, and not just trying to impress people with how cool I sound. I like to read other poets’ work out loud, to myself, so please, if you feel like it, read mine to yourself. Maybe it’s that I try to write things that it feels good to say out loud, I dunno.
Here’s a fun one for you to read out. (I wrote this not too long after I moved here.)

Amputee

This planet was a garden once. That may be the only thing that we can all agree on.
(Except that guy on 7th Street, the one with the tin-foil hat, who thinks
that we are just a cosmic Jr. Food Mart for some higher intelligence.
Maybe he’s right. Maybe we – the Egyptians, or the Masons, or somebody’s rich great-grandpa – sold the rights, or wrote up a 20 million year lease:
“Dino’s Exterminated Free!!! Withsalepurchaseofplanet, taxableinMilkyWayGalaxyat
nominalfeeof42% - Non-negotiable.)

However you look at it, we – biggest brain on the planet
(weeding out the competition daily)
- have turned it into a machine.
One big Willy Wonka factory of delights,
Well designed to … … … what?
Bring us pleasure? Yes, that’s it.

And so we crank up the machine, wind up the toy, streamline our costs, power up,
downscale, become more efficient, micromanage, multi-task, and increase our maximum potential. For … … … what?

To eat, drink, sleep, run, watch tv, immerse ourselves in sound, food, dreams, sex, love, art, babies, sunshine, cats, laundry, death, Oprah, clothes, advice, fear, words, work, skin, pain, exercise, gossip, church, drugs, books, tears, thought, paint, obsession, care, M.A.S.H., serial killing and other natural disasters, meditation, war, money, money, money, money, money, money, money, money, money, money, money, money, music, each other, and god, to … … … what?

To distract ourselves from the itch
or the pain
of the place
where our wings used to be.

***

This is another one that I love to read out loud. I seldom write rhyming poetry. I am not a Poet, and so I feel unqualified to dabble in such lofty pursuits as meter. But this little sonnet HAD to rhyme, as I also seldom write Lurve poeems, and the sentiment seemed to call for this form.
There’s also a funny and ironic story behind this piece.
My room mate during my last semester at USM and I were sitting on a bench outside the commons, watching folks come and go outside the cafeteria. We were discussing s-e-x – or actually the lack thereof, and we were using household terms as metaphors. In fact, it started off with Meg talking about the last time there’d been a “car parked in her garage”, and I said “Car, sheesh! I don’t even have a lawn mower in mine!” This of course degenerated into jokes about hiring lawn boys, etc.
While we were sitting there having this disgusting converse, we spotted our friend Joe Fujizo (who is a VERY nice and innocent, VERY Christian young man, as well as being a really buff and gorgeous Hawaiian/Asian bloke to boot) walking toward the cafeteria. Joe was never in a bad mood, always cheerful and positive and sweet, so I felt brave enough to stand up on the bench and yell across the way:
“JOE! WOULDST THOU MOW THE GRASS FOR ME?!?!”
(snicker, chortle, hee!)
without having any idea what I was talking about, Joe – in the first and last foul mood I ever saw him in replied:
“MOW YOUR OWN DAMN GRASS!!!” and walked on into the cafeteria.
Oh, the irony of it all. :)
In that moment, this poem was born, and though it began as a farce, and a play on dumb ole’ love poems, it ended as something entirely different. It is still one of my veryvery favorites (in the top five, prolly) and one of the most bittersweet and ‘tender’ things I have ever written.

Suburban Love Anthem

Would you mow the grass for me,
Or let the long leaves lie
Where heavy summer beetles breed
Beneath a green, candescent sky?

I’ve seen you carefully tend and tune
The mowers’ oily parts
As young lovers tune the emotional gears
Of one anothers’ tender hearts.

In waiting, on the patio,
I watch the mornig shadows pass
And hold my love, ‘guised lemonade,
In a cold, eternal drinking glass.

And as I stand and calmly watch
You part the green, unending sea,
I hope you’ll come, in your respite,
And drink, not from the glass, but me.

***

moo.
-sam


*with the exception of ‘professional poets’, it seems.
** X has written a HILARIOUS comedy act based on that very thing. It’s a little piece he calls “Blah.” When you meet him, or see him again, ask him to do it for you.