Him on the bank, you in the boat
might have been Proctor Lake
might have been my cousin July
tried out her teen sex on me when I was six
Can’t tell now that we are middle-aged

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Rough first draft in response to Zachary Schomburg’s prompt over at Read Write Poem. It’s a great prompt, worthy of many, many more attempts.

Find other responses here.

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I’m thinking about Lawrence, who is still around. He had to have a leg taken off earlier this week. I should have called him a few weeks ago. He’s been on my mind for months. But I didn’t. I only sent a card.

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(Do clink to get to a larger image, which is worth the effort, if I may humbly assert.)

I adore your name, Narcissus poeticus, and how you fold back your petals as if you’re getting a drink of water or facing the wind. How you open yourself to the bee.

The earliest mention of Poet’s Daffodil is likely in the botanical writings of Theophrastus (371 – c. 287 BCE), who wrote about a spring-blooming narcissus that the Loeb Classical Library editors identify as Narcissus poeticus. The poet Virgil, in his fifth Eclogue, also wrote about a narcissus whose description corresponds with that of Narcissus poeticus. In one version of the myth about the Greek hero Narcissus, he was punished by the Goddess of vengeance, Nemesis, who turned him into a Narcissus flower that historians associate with Narcissus poeticus. The fragrant Narcissus poeticus has also been recognized as the flower that Persephone and her companions were gathering when Hades abducted her into the Underworld, according to Hellmut Baumann in The Greek Plant World in Myth, Art, and Literature. This myth accounts for the custom, which has lasted into modern times, of decorating graves with these flowers. Linnaeus, who gave the flower its name, quite possibly did so because he believed it was the one that inspired the tale of Narcissus, handed down by poets since ancient times.

Go to the Wiki article for citations.

Related posts:

1. signs of spring in early winter or love letters to my frozen friends
2. more on hiking the Lewis River
3. flowers so lush they don’t seem real

Oh! Now I remember! It was on the SF Gate’s list of best poetry books of 2009.

Inseminating the Elephant, by Lucia Perillo (Copper Canyon; 93 pages; $22). Perillo’s insightful work is less silly and more philosophical than Billy Collins’, but just as funny. Imagine William Carlos Williams poems on roller skates, holding Roman candles in each hand, wearing a Viking costume, and racing down an abandoned waterslide, and you’ll get an idea of what reading Perillo is like.

Anything with the epitaph “Any idiot can face a crisis; it is the day-to-day living that wears you out — Checkov” has my interest, as if the above description wouldn’t have all by itself, or the book’s title.

Will let you know how it goes.

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And I didn’t have to wait months and months to hear.

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March — Read a poetry collection written by a poet who has been featured in a movie. This is a challenging one, but there are actually a number of movies about poets. Here is a link to get you started: 5 Favorite Movies Based on Famous Poets.

Yikes. Yikes, yikes, yikes. My WOTD.

Yikes is an explanation of excitement with a patina of fear, distress, worry, anticipation overlaid with a light hand.

I think I will start with this list.

Aha!

“Sherman Alexie inserts several of his own poems into the soundtrack of Smoke Signals.” I’m going to work on Alexie because 1) I loved Smoke Signals, 2) I have not read enough Alexie, 3) I simply prefer contemporary poetry.

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1. Poetry x 12

I’ve been reading a lot of poetry lately. And stories. And for February I was to read a recommended chapbook, so chose Pamela Johnson Parker’s A Walk Through the Memory Palace. I would like to be able to write a thoughtful commentary about it, but will have to simply say that I liked most of the poems. Quite a bit. I like the nature stuff & language, so that was no surprise, but there is one. One (at least) surprise.

I have a friend, who I am out of touch with, but who I adore, who will be having a radical mastectomy this month. Both breasts. As a radical cautionary, prophylactic measure. Her children never met her mother. I want to write her a poem. About her breasts. But Pamela beat me to it. My poem would be/will be different. But Pamela hit the subject as I would want to: “Breasts.”

(Who, whom. I don’t have time to be precise. She. You. Her. Breasts. Who has time?)

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March starts Daylighting the Rabbit Hole. Yikes. Yikes-a-mikes-a.

* * *

I may have a little more time available to me in the next few weeks. That may not be a bad thing in any category but my checkbook.

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My chorus is singing a gorgeous requiem for Good Friday services. John Rutter’s version of Fauré’s. It is a glorious work, and we will be combining our 30 voices with another chorus and have an orchestra to accompany us. It will be a Tenebrae service, which I have never been to, not even in my saved-by-Jesus phase or in my Catholic upbringing (I was there for the transition from Latin to English, just to date myself one more time). I am not a believer anymore. But I love church music like crazy. Cra-a-Azy.

Tenebrae means “shadows” in Latin and many Christian churches have versions of the service, some performed since the 5^th century. The service is marked by candles gradually extinguished while readings or psalms are chanted or recited.

“It has been said that my Requiem does not express the fear of death and someone has called it a lullaby of death. But it is thus that I see death: as a happy deliverance, an aspiration towards happiness above, rather than as a painful experience.” — Gabriel Fauré

“The ideal Requiem version seems to me to be that of 1893. … [It] remains a liturgical work for modest forces to perform in church, which is how the composer conceived it.” — John Rutter

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I have been fortunate to read a lot of friend’s & acquaintances published words lately. And they are so fabulous I don’t know how to say it very well. I shall try. Another time.

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I am sending my words out in the world. Yay! They are not as good as my betters, but I am happy with them.

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(Confession: I’m kind of nervous about creating in public.)

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1. wordless Wednesday
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3. wordless Wednesday