Maroon River

            It was still storming when I got up on Tuesday morning and I could only open one window a crack despite the heat being on. Even through that crack though I got little mists of snow on my face during yoga. The Dollarama parking lot was not ploughed until after I’d finished song practice and so the people that normally park there to get coffee at the donut shop beneath me had to go elsewhere. The snow banks were high wide and narrowing the streets and I was glad I didn’t have to deal with them until the next day.

            In the late afternoon I finally got caught up in my journal.

            I read the three poems of each of the members of my Poetry Master Class group. I read each poem twice and then made comments. I find Vivian tends to overwrite. She throws in a lot of unnecessary words. I suggested that she try writing the poems in a Twitter window and letting character limitation help her economize.

            Blythe’s poems are all very short with short punchy lines that don’t always flow together but they often work.

            Margaryta is the best poet among my three group mates. Her poems have a lot of depth, texture and intelligence. Also a lot of subtle anger at men.

            I revised the third stanza of my poem “The Street Sucks the Sandman’s Bag”. There were criticisms in class about my use of the words “female” and “events” that made me feel that I could make the gender references more clear.

            Here is the original:

I’m in the cold because it serves much more comfort

than lonely heated rooms.

It’s just where my life escapes me,

Do I even have a choice

of get away cars or routes?

Do I make things happen from this pivotal place

or just weakly mimic

some kind of female strengths?

It seems mostly women

can make events happen

even when they’re sitting in one place alone.

            Here is my revision:

I’m in the cold because it serves much more comfort

than lonely heated rooms.

It’s just where my life escapes me,

Do I even have a choice

of vehicles or avenues?

Can I make things happen from this pivotal seat

or does my gender

even generate the gravity

to draw women’s passion

on in for a landing

without passing this planet of passivity?

                                                                       

            I also revised my poem “Maroon River” though not based on anyone’s suggestions but rather just because presenting it caused me to look at it a little closer on my own.

            Here’s the original second stanza:

Testosterone’s tapping

the pussies like trees:

two fins for a swim in the estrogen sea.

and every space cadet is a nervous wreck,

twisting to watch their backs

as they float with the other space debris

in a twitching, spinning hoedown

around the quaking planet Crack.

            Here’s my revision:

Testosterone’s tapping

the pussies like trees

eight fins for a swim in the estrogen sea.

and every addict is a nervous wreck,

twisting to watch their backs

as they float with the other space debris

in a twitching, spinning hoedown

around the quaking planet Crack.

            I started cooking a potato at 20:00 but at 20:38 at medium setting my large element hadn’t been generating heat. It worked on high but maybe two fuses cover the big element. I had to eat a little later since I was starting from scratch. I heated a piece of pork and had the rest of my turkey gravy.

            I watched an episode of Peter Gunn guest starring Howard McNear as a Mr. Barnaby, mild mannered former member of several juries that failed to convict the city’s most prominent gangsters. Barnaby calmly goes on a one-man killing spree and he makes bombs that blow up their cars, birthday cakes and elevators. The mob on this side of the river hire Gunn to prove it wasn’t them that killed the boss from the other side. Gunn figures out the jury connection and finds the pleasant Barnaby building bombs in his basement. He casually admits that he killed the criminals. It turns out that Barnaby’s wife is in the state mental hospital and when he is arrested and told that he will probably be sent there too he is very happy.

            Before bed I revised my poem “Failed Launch for the Rocket of the Day”:

Failed launch for the rocket of the day just

into the sea with its stages.

Sinking, dripping self asks, “What’s it all for?”

but only the trash on the street has an answer.

My zombie crotch is rotting the moment

I smell it while standing over it.

Not connecting with the sad uglies

that stare me down with mad slug eyes.

If I should decide to shave and shower

it might kill the mood I'm under.

Flubbed song chords, no elation to sing it,

All is fashioned out of bullshit.

A failure masked by every success

plunges while strapped to the darkness.

Almost consider cutting my throat

but then what would I write about?