Poetry metacognition

I've been asked a lot where 

I get ideas for my poems and 

I don't know how to answer without

sounding fatuous or enigmatic 

or precious and tiresome 

To say I don't know is truth and lie

Can you know and not know

Or maybe you don't recognize

till you do and then you knew

you knew them all along? 

So I just start writing and see where it goes

Usually I end up more scribe than author

for there is an impetus I can't name 

that drives my thoughts and my pen

like spirit writing advertised at seances

What I've learned is that poems 

don't come from the atmosphere 

they don't grow on a tree like

ripe peaches waiting to be picked

if anything, poems pick you 

Mine come from muscle memory

and kneejerk responses and too long

silenced grief and frustration and 

feelings forced into tiny envelopes 

that can't hold them and split 

like a rug you stumble over because

too much litter has been swept under it

They source from my mind tree's trunk 

and course through my like sap in heartwood

They're don't come from or through, they are me.  

Some verse bursts like a lanced boil

others leak out in weeping you can't hide

some bubble up like a well tapped

others sit and stew, marinating this 

the time comes for them to speak out 

One thing I know for sure is you 

have to write when it's time. Don't push down

go big and deep and loud. Say stuff that 

might sound silly. Don't just say it, 

spray it like a huge graffiti mural

Don't let the hakken-kraks hush you 

don't second-guess or back down

it's poetry and there are no wrong ones

save those you don't give voice

that would be the real tragedy 

To rhyme is sublime and to not is fine

gonna try to break the rhyming

and the syllable counting habit 

so I can get my thoughts to coalesce

like turmeric and coriander bloomed in oil

more robust and diffuse and less restricted

rhyming can be a girdle worn

to compress or shrink ideas into 

tight boxes, but like Mexican  jumping beans

it may not flow in stricture of parsing 

in sound byte and measured stanzas

Rhyme isn't critical to  poetry

I mean look Williams' famous ditty

"this is just to say" about the plums

it was a note left on a fridge 

like an accidental scrap 

I didn't use to verse found it too tedious

but once begun my mind can't stop 

(Even now I'm seeking rhyme for tedious)

it's like you forget your mother tongue

by learning another language 

and having said that, rhyme is good discipline

it makes me struggle to find partners words 

and counting syllables gives a nice rhythm

poetry worth writing should come with 

some wrestling and head scratching and a few curses

It does however mean that I must forgo

words I'd really like to use because 

they don't fit, like a can that holds the door

open because it is proud of the shelf

But (there are lots of buts) that

too, stretches me to find that 

chef's kiss word to nail the dish

like the spice you didn't know was missing till you did

I test drive countless words to 

hit the flavor I'm seeking 

it might take Edison's 3,000 tries 

but when you get it right, you know

and the whole thing  lifts and takes off

and your heart sings

We came down from Birmingham one cold December day

in the shrine of the pine

in murky backdune gloam

last call for this train

as it steams us home

we're going deep tonight 

on lonesome railroad ride

 inhale and settle down or

We might miss the other side

listen to her rumble as 

she croons to hobo's squall 

earth mother locomotive 

sharing herself with us all 

Serdeczna Matko dear

so beloved it hurts to sing

I don't know much about you

perhaps we've met in passing?

load-bearing ferry-woman 

carries her children safely home

Gaia, our goddess mama 

will never leave us alone 

many images of mother

mashed like praties for me 

I'll have to go rogue 

to get any clarity 

choo-choo train and deity 

my Immaculata lady 

can anyone find my mama 

or a mama to love me?

 

I saw three ships come sailing

Father, son and Mother Mary 

she came down from Birmingham

one December day snowy 

Mixing references like drinks

upon this night-night train

is the only way to sort 

my mashed potato brain 

too cold to take off my coat

clacking away at my rhyme

cold that gets in your soul

and doesn't warm with wine

feet like ice blocks carved 

from lake Michigan whole 

when they used ice tongs

which grampa found and stole 

(from the abandoned Swett place in the dunes

long-forgotten. If they wanted 'em they should have taken them and they didn't so no harm done)

on highway made of steel

endless faceless porter men

no points, none keeping score  

Will we ever see their kind again?

the railway's done and gone 

but a few ghosts I sill see 

of old men and their daughters 

rolling out of Kankakee. 

I'm the dad and  daughter

my old man and the sea

Granddad and the porters on

the train they call Memory  

For my da and granda and my husband and his da and his granda and my boys and girls. And me. 

A silly little rondo of song

trinkle tinkle ring says 

the wind in the chime 

singing through the trees

in the chapel of the pine

to the belfry tower

hear bells grumble rumble

chanting out their prayers

in baritone choir mumble 

to the white steeple tall 

one ringer all alone 

on church in the vale

pulls his funeral tone 

to glockenspiel in park

mazurka herky jerk

xylophone frilly trill 

for dancers of clockwork

to the lady with harp

on a promenade pier 

gently caressing strings

for little kids to hear 

to children's kitchen band 

on kazoo and oatmeal drum

and kleenex box fiddles 

do loudly pluck and strum

to the bird in the tree 

in our yard in her nest 

tweets last post and chorus 

as we all head in to rest 

back round the music plays

full circle to the chime 

it all begins and ends again

in our chapel of the pine

(picture is a gate-crasher at our nightly orchestral hijinks. But welcome none-the-less). 

Thank you for reading

Thank you to all who read

my funny blog of rhyme

I don't know who you are

nor if with them you chime 

perhaps you stumbled here

by inadvertent mistake  

then found you some comfort

and thought a rest to take

the reason for the reading

is not for me to tell 

just know you're most welcome 

to stop and bide a spell 

Pardon our dust, scattered

ideas like crumbs everywhere

Fragments of markings strewn 

hang on, I'll clear a chair

so what shall we talk about

tho if you've questions, I fear

I'm better clacking keyboard 

then verbalizing thoughts clear

I don't explain my poems

and I will never defend 

read or leave as written 

on that I will not bend

They are surely imperfect 

I do not disagree 

but I stand by them because

they've always stood by me

So if you're here to browse

if you seek no fault to find

then sit down and grab a pen

and jot down what's on your mind. 

 

The printing press in the workshop in the basement

certain phrases have their say

in my poems frequently 

more than mere lexicon 

they're my spirit vocabulary 

black as printer's ink 

a simile I often use

meaning more than it says

exposing more than I'd choose

ink's only black in print and

black ink isn't black you see

it's a rainbow-hued spectrum 

revealed by chromatography

I only discuss the science

to distract from the memory 

of basement press and printer

making little name cards for me

letterpress cabinet drawer 

with names like copperplate bold

tiny metal characters neatly stored

such wondrous order to behold. 

Upon the composing stick 

he'd arrange moveable type

tempting trays forbidden me

about that I did often gripe 

typesetting print to read

was technology back then

the typewriter's clacking keys 

replacing human hand and pen 

now we push buttonless buttons

a mystery I can't comprehend

touch screens are now touchless

instead of mailing we say "send." 

now we don't write we "text"

instead of talking we "interface"

we talk to boxes not friends

connected in cyberspace

computers are nice compared 

to messy loud  printing press

or typewriter's many headaches

digit-less digital is less stress

we've got to look forward and

Grampa would be first to agree

looking only backward you miss 

all the cool new things to see 

But (there's always one) we still 

found something gestalt in the press

though always covered in ink

it' was a "type" of mood therapy I guess 

I often mind walk in the workshop  

down in Crestwood Memory Lane 

to sort, if allowed, his letterbox

I will never see the like again

Pictures from Wikipedia user https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Trimalchio and Willi Heidelbach. 

Sitting shiva by our lake

crickle camp fire crackles

from trickly drip mist bog

sip fine pine sap wine 

atop birchwood swamp log

wet wood smoky choky at

impromptu bonfire night 

midsummer daze-y haze

from rainbow flame light

translucent and transcending

tongues untied by the wine

ancient wisdom descending 

helped by fire, weed and vine

t'was ever thus, this ritual

immemorial riddles break

eternity's secrets told round 

primordial old growth lake

woods-wise elders saging

on life mysteries engaging

in papal enclave debating

acolytes attending on the aging

I was young by the lake

in paradise I called mine

I walked among giants once

upon a faraway long ago time

with an elder wise as a god 

nattering on freely we did 

never shushing  nor shaming 

keep mum was all he forbid 

demanding I ask my questions

treating them all with  gravitas

no matter how trite or common

only foolish was the unasked. 

unschooled yet wise past words

this trodder of untrodden way 

hoping my markings please him

because of him they have their say

he was more than Irish charm 

he'd charisma, gin and IT

with a splash of lemon pine

blarney with no bullshit

transparent where he could

opaque on his own pain

translucent when needs must

blurring bad with twilight rain

I've tried hard not to stray 

to printer's black ink rhyme

all it gets us is hurt by

my endless jitterbug with time. 

he passed so quietly it hurts

no footprints left by our sea

it's my job to share Opi's opus

to the jungling entrusted to me

I shall be the elder now

sitting shiva by our lake 

holding court with my littles

in a perfectly Granda wake

I love you Grampa-Opi Kinney. Moja droga ja cię kocham. 

Rest in peace. 

No second line on this funeral train

"just a closer walk with thee

grant it Jesus is my plea"

so many hymns I sung to God

yet love heaven withheld from me

we're told we've friend in Jesus

our sins and griefs  he'll bear. 

all my griefs and parents' sins I bore

never felt Jesus nor anyone there

I didn't see that till, well now

and that helps unravel a mystery

filling pews in all the churches

I sat pretty much alone and lonely

where were they when this 

church hopping they did

or maybe the question is 

where was I, their little kid?

All memories are of me alone

for the life of me I can't recall

shouldering too heavy burdens 

laid upon me by them all

I was scapegoat and servant

surrogate parent and spouse to all

I carried their privy cans of shit

and took for everyone a routine fall

a friend asked yesterday how

child me felt treated so odd

parents owning me like property

making me think they all were god

couldn't say, never thought about 

needs, wants, self verboten for me

existing in shadow like baby ghost 

stumbling clumsily along periphery 

dragged along begrudgingly 

bounced between his or her home

to their next big Ponzi scheme

never having a home of my own

Each obsessed with themselves 

and the new people they found 

expected to parent and char for all

used to them never being around

growing up by accident despite

their harm not because of their aid

dancing for scraps like a dog

being very and always afraid

fear of pissing them off 

I always made them so mad

fear of failing and being in their way 

those called stepparents, mom and dad

what pictures remain, so few do 

show my anxious pinched face 

trying hard to smile and perhaps 

oh frabjuous day, find my place

I've read, didn't know back then

that keeping mum, small and hid

wearing pain scars like death mask

are tell-tale signs of an abused kid 

now an adult or what passes for that

I still try to take up no space at all 

I pretzel and crumple myself up

like used Kleenex rolled in a ball

I'm sore everywhere, everything aches 

from bowing and bending myself so low

I've broken and torn myself  to shreds 

I don't know how much lower I can go

about the songs I sang in church

all this harm parents did only to me

dislocated, cold, shattered to bits

Friend Jesus was not anywhere to see

He may have been, we're told it's so

but surrounded by anger, hurt and pain

God seems blind, deaf, dumb and shut

you can't see the Son through storm and rain

they were so selfish and off 

whatever shit they wanted I gave

Provided for them at my own cost

still hear his shame from the grave

bitch of it is  I get relief

from parent cruelty I can't separate

no rest for the weary even in sleep

can't leave pain at the cemetery gate

voices yammering in my brain

dying only makes louder and worse 

songs choked by toxic fumes from

gaslighting powered funeral hearse

no hope for peace from this death train

forbidden the jubilant second line 

their jazz funeral express non-stop

 "closer walk" dirge march through time

The girl with the sandburr in her side

now that I'm out it's out

the dirty little secrets we kept

shackled by their heavy burdens

it's about damn time I wept

now that weeping's begun

hang on it's gonna get loud

ugly crying, threats and curses

to spit it out I'm not too proud

I'm stooping to their level?

you say but you don't know

there's no rock bottom to 

which my parents would not go 

You call my truth vindictive

two wrongs don't make right

you curse my darkness yet 

you offer me no light 

but pointing wrong way round

your wagging digit of blame 

excusing parent perpetrators

while scolding my spoken shame 

 

but just remember and beware

the lecturing you so often do 

when that finger you point at me

four more point back at you

it's not for her dirty secrets

that the kid is taking the rap

it's shit they did to her 

so shut your flapping trap 

open up mind and stop your

tone-deaf prat so crass

hear my inner child out

don't make yourself the ass

what you call disloyal is me 

calling out dad's vowed suicide 

premeditated death weaponized 

to make me cower and hide

and what about your mom

she's victim too you say 

funny now you mention it

that's exactly what she would say

"what about Nancy?" is the

burden of her theme 

her utter narcissism has

become a classic meme 

when dad dumped on me

mother turned her face away

concerned only about herself 

abandoning me each and every way  

when I asked for help 

she shrugged and tossed her head

callous to death and pain

let's focus on her instead

caring not that her little girl 

was drifting out to sea

in fact mommy cut the rope 

and glibly gaslit my reality 

since then and to this day

no one's ever thrown a bone 

being pre-emptively pall bearer 

was a fear I carried alone 

we didn't know nor spoke of

such things back in the day

well I lived then too and alonee

with no one to guide my way

and scuze me, did I just hear 

you defend adults who did not 

help to carry a child's load 

left her to shoulder the lot? 

Standing on your ignorance

I'm sorry that just won't do 

what you're ignoring is conscience

I'll hear no sermons from you

And spare me your fake pity

if sorrow you have for me 

I can't hear your caring

over your ignoring complicity

even if you confessed guilt

it's many days and dollars to late

Keep your  sorrys to yourself

They're well past their sell-by date

and funny how mea culpaes 

until eleventh hour wait upon

fire insurance apologies aren't 

worth the paper they're printed on

sorry they say but don't mean

you'll get no sad contrition

they're only sorry they got caught 

you'll be lucky to get admission

dressed in DARVO and excuse 

if admission you ever get 

then it's begrudgingly only

when trapped in their own net

but be careful, don't trust 

for there will surely be a snare 

that comes back to snag you 

when their sins they must declare

gaslighting was their legacy 

it's what silenced my voice 

groomed to bear their guilt 

having no aid, solace nor choice

help arrived late or not at all

it took me 60 years to see

all the scars and bruises they

continually inflicted upon me 

to rescue little me I 

write out my pain in rhyme

big me owes small her a 

life ring thrown back in time 

my grasp must exceed reach

If I'm us both to save 

arms stretched far and deep 

lest we sink under the wave

expect more dark verses

as I go down the well 

there's lots of us trapped there

and a lot more pain to tell

This ain't over, Jack (or) we've only just begun to die

Hello it's me again 

the death-eater dad's spawn

the brain-cursed kid on whom

the doom is starting to dawn

back for round two in the

memory goo-stew to romp 

got some personal hell to sort

and evil juju to curb stomp

parting gift from my pater's

dark flirtation with the grave

You haven't heard the last of  this, Jack

I've got an inner child to save

my old man who knew I 

hated him self-applying that name

when I tearfully told him so

LOLed and did it just the same

And speaking of dumping junk 

in your kid's mind to blight

it wasn't the only or worst 

for me he'd a special gelignite 

To call it by name is verboten

you can't even use the word 

it starts with sui and ends in cide

but fine for this kid to have heard

so I can't pen about the pain 

that my father inflicted on me

internet protocol forbids that I

spell out his threatened heresy 

and beyond threats, promising

he'd bring himself to an end

I'd cry and beg him not to 

he'd smirk and leave me to fend

( I was five). 

I see now he was bluffing 

my eyes washed clear by tears

the self-harm song he sung

just to trip-wire my worst fears

terrified that he'd upsticks and go

as he and mom had often done 

I'd walk through fire to shield him 

from the Ku-Klux-Klan of his gun

I see now it wasn't for me

that I body blocked my dad

it was for him that I feared 

it hurt like hell to see him sad

but now I ask myself was he

sad or were S-word threats a tool

to get me to do what he wanted 

to see me dance like a motley fool?

who sends a kid to fight the

demon horde in his stead 

combat fatigue like no other

it sent me out of my head

But a wary word to the wise

too little too late for young me

you can't fight the dark with only

dad's gaslighting by which to see

I'm so exhausted by grief 

and this poem has no close 

this ain't over by a long chalk

I've much more hurt to expose

there's no such thing as closure 

I'm bleeding from so many sores 

unlocking one door just leads to 

many more crazy confusing doors. 

But this ain't over Jack. Not even if the fat lady sings. 

(photo is me at age 6 or 7 around when he started his death threats)

Black Rhyme Time

I love to pen the poems 

of dunes and lake and rain

there are times for those but

also for my sonnets of pain

Shakespeare, or his ghost writ

bled out his heart in rhyme

I find dank verse comforting 

their harsh jarring notes sublime

I've a black parade of memories

but I won't sing a morbid tune

I'd a death-eater dad for that

it's to the falling but trying I croon 

ever notice how "help" can hurt? 

on essential cruelty BS we're fed

healing by inflicting suffering 

to bloodletting nonsense we're wed

 

Sure there's stuff I don't know

but I really don't get why 

if help helps and hurts hurts 

will it actually help if I die?

Cuz it really hurts like hell

That's how "therapy" can feel

by gutting, debriding and dicing are

they cutting off more than they heal?

That's where poetry has a place

to our suffering it gives voice

you can opt bearing down and tearing 

but know that you have a choice

we can sing out our bleeding

or in theatre we can bleed out 

is everything salvageable with verse?

that's what this verse is about

It's naive and yet I find 

salve in my bitter refrain  

my soul wounds embracing 

instead of opening up a vein

So let the blackness come 

let sorrowing heart waters flow

let justice roll down like tears 

as to my River Styx I go 

That's where the prussic acid

in my black rhymes originates

damned dammed up flood rivers 

neither pooh-poohs nor placates 

no condescending shush-hushing

Hurt must be screamed out in song 

all the little lost souls grieved for 

this shit won't be quiet for long

so with this ship I'll go down

and on this bloody hill I'll die

let's quit spit-balling platitudes

and take a stand on the why 

why so many broken people?

why do they choose the dark side

call it what you will it's the same

self-harm, or dare we say suicide?

So let's name it and claim it 

with guns and bombs we're sending

so many to what it fucking is

the endless end without ending 

and I don't have rhyme for that. 

Some us went down that path

to their promised uncloudy day

us blind, crippled, lame and insane

sent on our hopeless, helpless way 

And it's because I well recall 

many filthy, grimy bleak days

I don't want any of mine to 

trod in my footprinted dark ways 

ways which were preordained

by my death eating dad of yore

ways which I inherited but still  

I don't want to go down anymore

so now we come to the gist 

to prevent I WILL go down the

fiery slide to Hades and more 

whatever it takes to protect them

I'll open up that unhallowed door

I'm not brave but I owe

to my beloved posterity 

to exorcise demons so we

can I hope live clean and free

but I'll admit that I'm anxious

to face down Satan's horde

may handsome boatman Charon

ferry us both safely back to shore  

with love to my handsome boatman 

Albert by name, psychopomp by trade

(photo is me around 7 already carrying a lot of pain)

I found the moon for us

our dear Jakey A was a 

lovely little man child

though you daren't call him

lil guy lest the boy go wild 

workman was the name

young Jakob best preferred

(loudly demanding) by that 

title he should be referred 

his workman job description

included some duties at night

this industrious third shifter

made sure to do his tasks right

self-appointed watch to keep 

when day began to wane

he'd always find the moon for us

from his bedroom window pane

when moon played hide n seek

and Luna was difficult to find 

Our Magus persisted diligently 

that rascally orb to mind 

nights when moon was new

her face seemed turned away  

Jake would explain she had to

shine on other kids that day

or when on stormy nights 

she couldn't be found at all

he'd cheerfully remind us she

still shone behind cloud pall 

 

his efforts were appreciated

keeping track was too much work 

it's nice to have a moon finder 

who never does his task shirk

adults get busy and we forget

simple pleasure can be ours 

thank God for our workman

displaying his universe of stars 

he was emcee and impresario

at the stellar moonshine show

bidding us come and hurry 

to see friend moon all aglow 

sometimes it takes a small one 

musing upon the heavens above

to draw our attention moonward 

and to help us feel her love

Jake now wears the dad hat 

has his own flock to tend

adulting leaves no moon time 

when there's work without end

but happily for everyone

a successor was begat 

a sweet starry-eyed maiden 

to wear the moon minder hat

All's well that ends well

now we've a star tender again

each night she finds the moon for us

Thank you, dear little Flora Lane 

our Gen 2 skygazer performs her

job, like pa, conscientiously

never a night goes by without

her checking for the moon to see

We're blessed, said the spider

for just a moment in time 

to gaze outside the window and

dance to earth's eternal rhyme

So peek out your peek hole

in whatever nest you call home

moon is smiling down on you 

to say you're never truly alone 

With love to the Magi, then, now and to come