Poetry Corner Monday

I have a thing for the last line of a poem. I could love every sound, every punctuation mark in every stanza, but if the last line doesn't cause some sort of shift in the tectonics of my mind, I'm disenchanted.

I read this poem, by Dorianne Laux, then read it again, and again after that. I was so enamored of the way it ended that it didn't even occur to me that the poem might continue onto the next page. I typed it out, posted it, then settled back down with the book only to discover once I turned the page that there were six more lines I hadn't seen. I have to say, after falling so quickly in love with what I thought was the final perfect sentence, I was more than a little disappointed with the actual ending. I'm posting the poem anyway, though, because I do still love the sentiment. Let me know after you read it if you agree that it would have been stronger had Laux ended with "loving them / for their uselessness, not wanting to be saved."

Antilamentation

from The Book of Men

Regret nothing. Not the cruel novels you read

to the end just to find out who killed the cook, not

the insipid movies that made you cry in the dark,

in spite of your intelligence, your sophistication, not

the lover you left quivering in a hotel parking lot,

the one you beat to a punch line, the door or the one

who left you in your red dress and shoes, the ones

that crimped your toes, don't regret those.
Not the nights you called god names and cursed
your mother, sunk like a dog in the living room couch,
chewing your nails and crushed by loneliness.
You were meant to inhale those smoky nights
over a bottle of flat beer, to sweep stuck onion rings
across the dirty restaurant floor, to wear the frayed
coat with its loose buttons, its pockets full of struck matches.
You've walked those streets a thousand times and still
you end up here. Regret none of it, not one
of the wasted days you wanted to know nothing,
when the lights from the carnival rides
were the only stars you believed in, loving them
for their uselessness, not wanting to be saved.
You've traveled this far on the back of every mistake,
ridden in dark-eyed and morose but calm as a house
after the TV set has been pitched out the window.
Harmless as a broken ax. Emptied of expectation.
Relax. Don't bother remembering any of it. Let's stop here,
under the lit sign on the corner, and watch all the people walk by.

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter from the fake half-Jews of the Gibbs/Margoshes household!

All in a Saturday's Work

I had what I would call a mediumly productive Saturday. I went for a run, vacuumed my room, took out my garbage, mowed the lawn, and cleaned the fishbowl (after which Rosencrantz and Guildenstern floated melodramatically to the top of the bowl, as they do every week after, as if the change in the water's bacterial levels was debilitating to their fragile fins. Wusses.) My mom and I watched the LA/Sporting Kansas City game, and after SKC kicked the Galaxy where the stars don't shine I ran some errands.

The LA/SKC game, along with this weekend's Sounders game against DC United, made for some shining moments of humor that were enough to keep me, a raving lunatic when my boys don't win, from hurling my empty bowl of popcorn at the TV screen after we tied. (That's right: We didn't win and I wasn't pissed. Look at me go.) Three of such moments are the following:

1. One of the DC United players goes by the name Perry Kitchen. Unfortunately for him, when this name is spoken aloud by pretty much any person in any circumstance it sounds mighty close to "Harry Kitchen." "I wouldn't want to cook there," I said, and my mom followed that up at halftime by suggesting that we call him "Furry Kitten." She seemed pretty proud of this nickname until the second half when she decided that he should actually be called "The Stove." I suggested "The Blender." We felt very happy of ourselves. (For those of you who didn't catch that reference, I implore you to watch this video of a little boy who has just learned how to ride his bike. No need to thank me.)

2. Maicon Santos, one of DC's top players, had shaved the sides of his head to create the beginnings of a mohawk. (And when I say "mohawk" I'm being generous. His hair was already so short that his 'do just looked like a stripe down the center of his scalp that was just a shade darker than the skin around it.) My mom and I attempted a couple jokes at the expense of this hair, but it wasn't until the cameras showed him catching his breath while an ad for DQ chicken strips flashed across the bottom of the screen that my brother shouted "Chicken Strip!" and the camera panned in on Santos's head. Cue raucous laughter for the next seven minutes.

Also, can we agree as a country--and really, a soccer universe--to be over David Beckham? Yes, he's an incredible athlete. Yes, he has the build and features of a Greek god. But really, is there anyone who doesn't know that? Is he really news anymore? Can we please just cool it on Beckham? Thanks.

Poetry Corner Wednesday

There's Poetry Corner Monday, and then there's Poetry Corner Whenever-I-Feel-Like-It. Clearly this is the latter. In my defense, I meant to post this on Monday. I just didn't.

I dedicate this week's poem, by Billy Collins, to all my former English teachers. (Hockley, I love and miss you and think of you each and every day.) I've often wondered if teachers thought about the musings of this speaker (who I will refer to as "the speaker" for all my professors who cautioned me against assuming that the poet/author is the voice of the poem/story, even though I know for a fact that the speaker is Collins himself. Let it be known that I have sufficient evidence to back up this claim, but I will refrain from presenting it here for the sake of brevity.)

Schoolsville

Glancing over my shoulder at the past,
I realize the number of students I have taught
is enough to populate a small town.

I can see it nestled in a paper landscape,
chalk dust flurrying down in winter,
nights dark as a blackboard.

The population ages but never graduates.
On hot afternoons they sweat the final in the park
and when it's cold they shiver around stoves
reading disorganized essays out loud.
A bell rings on the hour and everybody zigzags
into the streets with their books.

I forgot all their last names first and their
first names last in alphabetical order.
But the boy who always had his hand up
is an alderman and owns the haberdashery.
The girl who signed her papers in lipstick
leans against the drugstore, smoking,
brushing her hair like a machine.

Their grades are sewn into their clothes
like references to Hawthorne.
The A's stroll along with other A's.
The D's honk whenever they pass another D.

All the creative-writing student recline
on the courthouse lawn and play the lute.
Wherever they go, they form a big circle.

Needless to say, I am the mayor.
I live in the white colonial at Maple and Main.
I rarely leave the house. The car deflates
in the driveway. Vines twirl around the porch swing.

Once in a while a student knocks on the door
with a term paper fifteen years late
or a question about Yeats or double spacing.
And sometimes one will appear in a windowpane
to watch me lecturing the wallpaper,
quizzing the chandelier, reprimanding the air.