#stupidlittleclouds

 

It will be etched into the sky
by a cloud concerned with record keeping
and celestial loafing. Three truths and an
exaggeration for the sake of a resume,
A beautiful suggestion of what might
Be true in alternate timelines of existence
or maybe just tomorrow. 

It won’t always be this way, not with
any sort of certainty. No guarantees
will be made here. 

Two things are certain: this and that. No,

I will not elaborate.

Even the clouds, with all their stenographic tools 

and skills, are only making rough outlines for
a vague public record. Shells of what was
being said and done here. Their version of the events
is maybe not, as we might consider it, the full story.

From up there? Angle is all wrong. Distance makes
the mind’s heart wander, fuzzes out the key players
on the stage far below. There are no opera glasses
available to even the most prestigious cloud.

Down here? Even my heart. Thumping away in my stupid chest.

Letting my stupid blood course through me, to propel me
forward to further stupidity and acts of clumsy goodwill.
Even that, in its heat and its
constant awareness. 

Even my heart lies. To me and

to you. And there’s no cloud worth its

weight in moisture and excess and probably

forever plastics that has any sense in its

stupid cloud brain to record my lies

with honesty. 

(Poetic) Protest Song

Today is another day where I will struggle to 

Exist in static

The worn grooves on a record

Shouting their voices

Free myself from a simple dread that

Only a single sound escapes the broken sound machine

What if this is the only trick I have left?

Left to my own

Devices/song continues

Droning endless/sing

Me another one/now

My life, a reduction in force, less

Notes looking prettier than before

Tempted by the truth, no more

You can’t tell me I’m not trying here. I promise

The notes in an avalanche again

Given as a gift to right now

Left out for another day

Find it when they find it

Absence and Presence

Both are the same

In static

Buzzing

Squalls

I’m going to continue through it all/Going to know the noise/Going to keep exploring some edge of something and hope it takes shape/eventually

Reunion

HOUSE KEEPING: [Cross post] here is a recent essay I wrote comparing how Revival Season (a rap duo) and Yard Act (an indie/post-punk band) employed the elements of dance music. I hope you enjoy it. It's been weird not posting everyday and it has been hard to find a rhythm for concepts without Napowrimo prompts. 

spent and waiting for land
while lurching through tempest after

tempest more of a like kind dripping
Into each moment i am well i am

well i have never felt more in control of

my extremities never felt it coming
when my own umbilical cord leapt out from
the spent body parts trays of yesterday   wrapped
me up in a familial embrace this was a north
star this was mother’s milk this was everything
a warm handshake of the soul is meant to signify

reaching for my neck bring me in closer   slither into place
tighten the hold   cut off the air let me brain see the fireworks
i’ve been waiting for to erupt from my correspondence a view of

perfection each of us made clean

Way/Weigh Station

Back to the weekly posts after a rather fruitful Napowrimo. 

I’m already here. Shepherded by bus
in the infancy of night, before the changing
of the guards. Sky and moon, solitary
jailors, an unblinking vigil. You and me
and each of the sky’s flashlights. Searching,
what have they found? Their patience, unblinking,
impassive. Something that screeches into
the colder portion of night, without sound,
in the desperation of a wounded animal, one
who knows that its tormenter has caught
the scent, has circled back, sharp object
in hand, a dream of satisfaction playing
on the mind’s projector reel. silence, take me,
take us all. i can hear the braying of the beast
i can feel the cold dew on my bare feet, creeping
forward through a cold, satisfying chill soon a gnashing
soon a moment reaches it terminus soon an
ending soon another ending and another ending
soon the daylight

soon   

Napo 4/30/24 Johnny Appleseed at the Apple Orchard

The final prompt for this year's Napowrimo. As always, it's been fun. Thanks for reading along with me.

We made a mistake posting our weekend plans

to our digital footprint. It was only a matter of 
time that Johnny Appleseed himself, who my husband
met and endured at a local plant enthusiast meet-up,
saw we were headed to the local orchard.

"am total-e interested in their stock! see u their [sic]."

Johnny knew apples. Johnny came rolling up in
his honey-crisp-colored Camry. He hugged me, he
hugged our friends, he hugged the person who sold us
tickets--even though he was unhappy that it cost money to
commune with the apples and the trees.

"A tree for you/A tree for me/every tree is free/ho-wheeee"

he sang, though I could tell that his merry tone was judging
the capitalist endeavor he was now paying for, in nickels. 

He refused to take the tractor.
"My feet are mine/the earth is warm/and so I go in Earthen form/dooo-orm!"

I just assumed he was out of nickels, but I should have known
this was a sign, a red moon, that 
things were heading south with alarming speed.

We watched as he ran from person to person, accosting them as they casually took a bite of 
an apple and cast the rest aside. I'll admit, that did seem wasteful, but we could hear Johnny's shrieks over the hum of the tractor, the jangling bumps, the scratching sounds of hay against us.

"waste not/want not/mother tree/I save thee/who-freeeeee!"

And then he started thwacking people with his traveling stick, but not with ill intent, more like a gentle "hey stop that, no I'm serious, I'll do it again" sort of thing. He took the apples cast aside and, with a loving gesture, putting them in his rucksack, skipping from person to person and repeating these actions.

The orchard sent their champion, a hulk of a man with dirt on his hands and an adequate mustache, to apprehend Johnny. There they dueled, Johnny swinging his traveling stick like a frothing mad raccoon, the champion slammed his fists together, yelling profanities at Johnny. Children covered their faces. Our baser instincts took over and people began to take bets. I put 15 nickels and a bag of Honeycrisp on the orchard's champion.

Johnny came in quick. Blows rained down on the champion. I am told his name was Phil. Phil took a nasty shot to the head and lurched backward. 

"The voice of the apples/ the bringer of justice/I return you to the dirt/now grow an orchid!"

Johnny was losing his rhythm, his ability to rhyme
as he tackled Phil and beat him about the head.

"I think he's actually going to kill him." said my husband. Johnny screamed something incoherent at Phil's unmoving form and struck him again. and again. and again.

The police arrived and subdued Johnny with rubber bullets and at least 2 tasings. Phil was good and dead at this point and his body looked the part. We watched from the now-stalled tractor, Johnny was escorted away, a look of triumph on his face, the one and true champion of the apples.

Napo 4/29/24 Elegy

Today's prompt. I resisted the urge to call this poem "Leonard's version." I share this with you now because I am a flawed vessel.

I'm going to say some kind words now,
rose colored coloring activities for adults
while the children busy themselves on the margin.

I'll say you lived well enough-like a river

boat on a lazy afternoon with a limited gambling license.
There's always someone willing to try their luck.

Your luck was fireworks midday-loud percussive
thumps whose visual quality was dulled by another
sunny day. So much sun, so many explosions.

I'm going to miss the eager smile of yours-some
new bad idea creasing your forehead-the scrunch

that comes from loving you and your machinations.

I know, you are looking at us, from some unknown

direction and nodding vigorously. Hell is up, Heaven is
down, the rest is in between, they say. You always laughed.

I hope they were right about the in between-that some
small piece of you exists within our current space. Never 
here exactly, but always near enough to us. You there, smiling.

Napo 4/28/24 The Birds The Musical

Today's prompt. 

here, i am a bird, a furnace of bird song and feathers
power line musical choreographed to my birdsong
each refrain, a prayer, pitch repeating. an endless molting.

Napo 4/27/24 I Too, Might As Well Sing America

Today's prompt invites us to write an American Sonnet. I have resisted baser instincts and tried to take this one seriously. 

Lost to the crack in a Liberty Bell. The cracks of time
lengthen from center to edges. Emma Lazarus has
been leaving messages about my extended warranty.
I'll tell you that I've never felt less free when opening
my mailbox to find the names of a previous resident. How
have they remained at large for so long? How, do I 
disappear entirely? "Neither a borrower nor a lender be"
said a man who would fit right in here, at the pulpit and 

on my answering machine. Saying nothing and
Everything. Schrödinger's Sentence. and
I am now and truly a boiling pot, water leaking 
out and shattering the ceramic stove top. 
I hold these truths to be self-incriminating.

I hold the tired, the wretched, the poor, the best,

the worst. Shaken, not stirred, with fervor. Ready for you.

Napo 4/26/24 Spherical Lyrical Miracle

Today's prompt invites us to play with alliteration, consonance, and assonance. I'm so sorry that it has come to this poem. 

Assonance, assiduous, arrived at the bar, atlas in hand. 
"Drink, dear sir!" No damsel in distress (duress too, one supposes)  would be denied. 

Dissonance, seated to her left, hissed soundly so to as to dismiss, longed for conspicuous lists of
trysts from beyond the mists.

Consonance, concerned with copious conundrums, cornered Assonance and clarified his callous conjuring: "Love is long in the legumes. Reeled in with reason while writhing in the reeds."

Grandpa Alliteration is at his trusted stool, sipping sloppy from the Sapporo bottle again. A man who knows his mettle, seated on metal, salt like the earth long settled, wilted like petals. "UGH." he laments.

The writer falls face first in his filet. This failed farce has gone on too far. The sound police, along with those with reason and taste, are chanting their disdain for what he has done. May God grant him grace.

May the Gods of Poetry load their righteous lightning bolts(TM), or soliloquy cannons(also TM), or whatever it is they shoot, strike down this war criminal. Put him in the Poetry Hague.

For what it is worth, he is cackling maniacally. Who will win Assonance's favor? Will the writer ever finish his steak? Are the Gods Poetry Wrathful, Just, or Merciful? Why is this poem written in couplets?

They've lost the plot, sir.
They've lost the plot.

Napo 4/25/24 Proust Questionnaire Part 2000

Today's prompt. I opted to write a new set of questions without answers.

1. What is your favorite occult happening? You may not choose one that has happened in the last 73 years, even the really juicy ones. Yes, even that one.

2. If happiness were a bird, how would you cook and present it for your friends?

3. If happiness were a bird, how would you cook and present it for your enemies?

4. If happiness were a bird, how would you cook and present it for a stranger?

Choose EITHER question 5-6 based on your current level of happiness
5. If you are not happy, what amount of monetary gift would make you forget your unhappiness?

6. If you are currently happy, what amount of monetary gift would make you set fire to your favorite possession, poison your flowers, and give your dog to a mortal enemy?

7. Will you give me exactly seven dollars?

8. What if I told you seven dollars is enough money for me to achieve my lifelong dream of meeting Celine Dion at a random Cafe and to buy her a seven dollar coffee?

9. Do you think seven dollars is an inappropriate amount for a coffee? 

10. Pretend you are Celine Dion: would you feel uncomfortable if your self-professed "Number One Aficionado" presented you with a seven dollar coffee?

11. Setting aside Celine for just a moment, would it be accurate to say that I have the bluest eyes you have ever seen?

12. Do you think that I am making this questionnaire too much about myself?

13. Who is your anti-hero?

14. Have you ever touched a hot stove as an adult because you listened too well when you were a child and wanted to see why everyone made such a big deal about it? 

15. What is one secret talent you possess? For this question, it is imperative that this secret talent is one you definitely do not want other people to know about it.

16. Are you interested in participating in a Secret Talent Show?

17. If we were at a dinner party, and I'm talking about a fancy one with multiple forks and smooth-ish jazz playing in the background-at least a business casual dress code, would you demand ketchup for the appetizer if ketchup were an appropriate component to your enjoyment of the dish?

18. If, at this dinner party, there were a celebrity, say Celine Dion, would you walk up and put your arm around her and sing "My Heart Will Go On" into her ear with tenderness? 

19. Would you choose a different song?

20. Which writer of critical acclaim would you most like to invite to a dinner party and feed poisoned food?

21. What hours are you most likely to be away from your home?

22. Is it more appropriate to live to work to work to live?

23. How do you feel about those fake rocks people buy to hide a key to their house on their property?

24. What is my greatest strength? Note: I am asking about myself.

25. Approximately how much wealth do you possess and what percentage of it is "lying around" the house and easily accessible?

26. Do you plan for retirement?

27. What would you like engraved on your tombstone?

28. Would it be appropriate to say that you and I are closer than friends but certainly not a sibling or a lover?

29. Is there a safe anywhere in your home? If so, what is its security rating?

30. Will you remember me when I'm gone?

31. Will anyone?

32. What is a nightmare of yours that has come true?

33. Can I have that seven dollars now?

34. Are you happy?

35. Now?

Napo 4/24/24 Resolvency (is not a word and I know it)

Today's prompt is based on a line I stumbled upon in a perusal of Poetry Foundation's website. The poem is called "Transformocean" and it is by Samuel Gregoire and translated by Forrest Gander.

There is no way to end the story
without more words
more pages
the sentiment's quick dulling
with no whetstone in sight.

Little flecks of gold
all over the character arc,
careening towards
this impossible
resolution.

Beseech the muse?
How many sacrifices 
of livestock to quell 
the burning, to extinguish
this minor conflagration?

The chord resolves itself
in unclear harmony, 
followed by shuffling of feet
and coughs
from an audience left
unsatisfied

Napo 4/23/24 Hero's Journey (with fashion)

 Today's prompt features a hero that we all deserve and is totally made up.

From the sky, a whinny from an unsatisfied wood chipper.
Dropping to the ground, a spectacle, flailing man,
chartreuse cape, Bright yellow, form fitting, jumpsuit. Icarus in gaudy linens. The robin dropped 
too soon from the nest. A penny from the skyscraper that kisses
clouds. The missile that knows its time has come to a close.

This man, yelling for dear life, dropping from a point unknown
has forgotten his wings, again. Not for the first time.
Hoping for the bailout. The trees are growing larger. The ground's features 
more precise. His shouts more desperate. His cape, still chartreuse. The observers,
mostly hungry for a spectacle, something new, are licking their lips. Turning the phone towards
the inevitable meeting point between ground and our hero.

Our hero. No stranger to desperation. Now sobbing, pleading with some invisible ally. Shouldn't this already be over? Falling for what seems like hours. Time does not flow ordinarily when this affront to fashion descends from a point unclear to the firmament.

Accepting his fate, he stretches his arms, shouts some attempt at a catchphrase and closes his eyes.
Landing with a thunderclap thud that echoes like a dull roar from a bored jungle cat who has just woken up from an uninspired nap. The ground projects a sad mushroom cloud of unimpressive dirt. Quick to dissipate. 

"I'm OK." Comes a shout. The mixture of triumph and a sly grin.

He does this every time. When will we learn?

Napo 4/22/24 Slim Pickings

Today's prompt explores the disagreements between an Osage and Mandarin oranges.

Nature's barbed wire before the foreclosure. Lost in Merriweather's pocketbook. Left to wither with the other seedlings on an adventure that no one cares about except those interested in the deep cuts. The kids said you looked like a brain on the side of the road.

[Your ripeness repels me. Good for a salad, good for the gander. You're a top 40 hit, nothing more. They all know your songs and your words, but none of the feeling is really there. Background noise for the livestock to bleat to when something crosses their vision.] 

You're only here because your wood burns well. You're only here because they don't know what do with you. Wash out my eyes, I think. You leak the milk of human kindness, but that kindness is not your own. It is the weakness of the 1900s when it should have set your orchard ablaze to warm the cooler nights.

[Vapor as a smile. Cool eyes showing nothing, my how your citrus lights up the palate of the chain's patronage! Their tongues alight with the dash of flavor you provide. I am an oddity, but you are commodity. Flavor appropriation. Exotic. Palate cleans before the boiled potatoes return to the food rotation.]

A feast for the deer. Found later, mangled in the grill of the SUV that ended the deer's life. Seeds spread far and wide by American Automobile Ingenuity. There is blood all over your branches. Those thorns can't keep the truth away forever.

[What truth lies past my defenses? What knowledge lies beyond your skin? The ease of peeling a piece of you away. Remove the excess, enjoy what is left, discard it all. I knew you before you knew yourself. They were never surprised either. Mass consumed, fondly brayed about in passing, and forgotten soon after. Compliments to the chef.]

Napo 4/21/24 Also Ran

 Today's prompt is inspired by the color Smaragdine, which is number 7 on this list.

In a dull shadow to the luster of another,
whittling to pass the time.
The shavings accrue in molehills
turned mountainous.

A joy- oh, craftsman of the wild-
in the braying of the pack
in the whistle of the leaves
tussled by the breeze.

Dread knock of leaf crunch
the usurper has arrived
once more
to lay claim to the clearing.

Let it be another's,
be content as the tent is raised,
as the barking commences
as sun rises and casts itself to shadows once more.

you are something of a different
piece. Though this place, you are
much more than what will come from its lost reverie.
You are the deep sigh of the woods. Remaining.

Napo 4/20/24 Recital

Today's prompt. I had to resist the urge to write about one of the big inflection points in history and instead opted to go into "Deep Research" mode (aka Googling "Strange Historical Moments" and seeing what popped up). I found this.

Calling me, darkness burns
through the hole in my shoe, creeps

along my nerve endings. A twist
of hip, enterprising jazz hands

holds the feeling at bay.
settle the brushfire

jitterbugging on a
stage made for me. For you.

Bill's cousin's cover band
playing the hits, running through

numbers, eyes bloodshot, a
worried pallor. The fourteenth encore. This is

more than a gig. No more solos. Foxtrot.
Born to Die Hand Jiving. Paint-by-rhythm.

Even my prayers, a melody that
seeks relief. Take on the 1 and 2

of the bass-snare-bass-snare
and I genuflect on cue.

Up and down and up and down
bleed me in a waltz.

You make me want to shout.
I will never wait a minute again.

Choreography for the revelation.
The song begins again.