Monthly Archives: September 2008
Link
Here’s a gem from Paul Selig, director of Goddard College’s MFA in Creative Writing program. That’s the program I’m in!
My new apartment
I relocated recently to an apartment in another building not far from where I was living before. I had been living on the fifth floor, the top floor. Now I live on the second floor, the lobby floor, of an eight-story building. There is a floor below mine that is the ground floor, but Puzzle and I can actually walk out of here via the front entrance without using the elevator, as there are stairs (or a wheelchair ramp) leading to the entrance.
A poem I just located called “Port Townsend”
I recently moved and unearthed some notes from the January 2008 Goddard College residency in Port Townsend, WA that I attended last January. I did this poem in a workshop. Here it is out of my notes verbatim:
PORT TOWNSEND, JANUARY2008
Port Townsend
Chilly, not cold like Massachusetts
green, not black and white
muddy as a puppy’s paws
Grass growing alive with stories
lots of white buildings surrounded
by drizzly fizz
Ocean push-pulling on the beach
thoughts of Evil in my head
Port Townsend
So I’ll tell it:
I’ll tell about chilly, not black and white
not cold like Massachusetts,and green–
muddy as a puppy’s paws
Grass growing alive with stories
I’ll tell about lots of white buildings
surrounded by drizzly fizz
I’ll tell about–so sorry am I–
Ocean push-pulling on the beach
A crack of sun–now gone clouded and bare
In my head: Thoughts of Evil
that have nothing to do with you.
“Litany” with a wink at Elizabeth Bishop
Litany
The day I lost my mother’s breast I gained sustenance
The day I lost my way home from school I learned trust
The day I lost my mind I journeyed forth into the world
The day I lost my agility I gained fluency
The day my bones gave out I learned to remember
Lost hair, a pulled tooth, three screws in the right femur
They say a penny lost is another gained
But the day I lost you, Dear, I lost the vessel that held mylife
After I lost that jar, I had no place left forpennies.