Monday, May 29, 2006

Memorial Day Update

slog2live came about Jan. 1
in the usual resolute way
not at first for poems
not at all

More typically, something along the lines of
"Beautiful warm summer day, the sound of a boat motor drifting under the jet noise some miles up..."
no, even that sounds more like poetry now...

But it is a beautiful day.
I'm sitting on the porch,
off to my right is the recently featured oak tree
and on the table, a cup of hot tea.

I don't know many war dead,
or for that matter, war living.
A few. There are many.

A dog strolls into the yard,
sniffing purposefully.
I shoo it away, or at least
shout. Then, run out
and throw a tea bag at it.

The dog is quite friendly
and comes wagging its tail.
I remark that it's too friendly.
It gives a slight woof and moves on.

Memorial Day. My wife and son
went to watch the parade.
I suppose I should have too.
He wanted to watch (and hear) them shoot the guns.

Boys are famous for liking to make things into guns.

Today I want to take stock of where slog2live:

  • has been
  • is
  • is going
This is also a pattern that people are famous for doing.

The trouble is,
I don't really feel
like there's time to do a recap, and
I doubt that you
really want to spend time
reading about it.

(I mean, it's all there in the archives)

The only thing I'd point out is that initially it was an effort to get organized.

Then it morphed to being an assortment of efforts at poetry.

I'm not very sure where it will end up. But I do hope to improve at being organized, and also at being expressive with poetry.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

The best feature of your posts is that for a minute I forget I'm reading and I'm living a moment that you had, shooing a dog, throwing a tea bag at the dog, looking to the sky at the birds, sparse enough for my mind to conjour up the smelly colourfull details but precient enough so that I feel a hot cup of tea in my hand, and can see a new and vulnerable oak on the yard. An honerable poem. Indeed, "Boys are famous for liking to make things into guns." Salut.

polona said...

steve, your posts are a pleasure to read (and/or look at)!
no matter where this takes you, you're doing very well!

Pat Paulk said...

Steve, I don't know about the organization, but the poetry is coming along nicely. Hell forget the organ-a-whatever thingy!!!

J. Andrew Lockhart said...

"A dog strolls into the yard,
sniffing purposefully.
I shoo it away, or at least
shout. Then, run out
and throw a tea bag at it"
This happened to me late at night recently! :)
I love your work -- no need to look back-- I quite looking back a long time ago.

floots said...

just keep writing
i enjoy reading
be it
re-caps
poetry
musings
or
blank staves
:)

steve said...

ryan, polona, pat, andrew, floots - thanks to each of you for these kind words. I'm surprised at how it feels kind of healing to read these - healing from what, I'm not sure - but it does:)

A Bear in the Woods said...

I love to play
along the blurry boundary
between poetry and prose,
throwing teabags at stray dogs
on the day devoted to the worship of guns,
and elevating those who serve them.
:)