NaPoMo Day 7-10 Poems

It's day 10 of NaPoMo, and I'm writing away but this year, I'm not entirely stoked about my work.

Last year around this time I was breathing poetry. Newly in love, it felt like everything I touched in the supermarket, every conversation I heard on the street, every person I saw in the park could be a new poem. Plus, I had this really amazing project to work on, my black and wtf poems. In 30 days I pumped out some of the best, most surreal stuff I've ever written, and I loved every single line. Poems about goats on slides, elephants trying to stuff themselves into cars, comforting bears, men making Snooki giant pickles, etc. When I re-read these poems, I feel like they could really go somewhere. I'm newly inspired right now to rework and submit them. I like the commentaries they make, they way they talk about our world.

But this year, I'm pretty much just journaling. And, that's OK too. I'm happy to be writing, but the result is that I feel like these poems are just for me, and maybe my little group of friends. At the end of the day, I don't think anyone on a larger scale will want to read me pontificating about the differences between France and the USA, or how much I hated my job back home, or my personal struggles. To be short and sweet, I don't think I'm writing anything that anyone hasn't already written.

Again, this is not a complaint. I've been so busy with school and work and taking up running again and planning voyages around Europe, I didn't even think I'd get past day one of NaPoMo. And I certainly haven't made any time for journaling. So these poems will someday be a nice little thread for me to hold on to my April 2012 days.

Oh, and for the record, I am still crazy in love, but we've been doing the long distance thing, so the physical electricity that lets me tranform everything I touch into a poem is on vacay for now.

Here's some of what I wrote this week:

Day 7 I rehash an old prompt from poetry workshop years ago.
I Sold my Virginity on Ebay

Today, a search for virgin turns
up 58,653 results. I stand
out among the virgin neem
oil, the barely legal videos,
the virgin mother statues,
the CDs from Virgin Records.
For 10,000 bidders, I assure
the eBay buyer protection
and the certificate of authenticity.
Yeah, Ebay has a rule about nudity,
but this bidder wants more than a bare
ass or tits anyway. My photo gallery shows
my parts separately: sharp elbow, jawline,
above upper lip, upper thigh. The winning bidder
is a polite businessmen. We agree, my virginity
will arrive in 5-7 business days. But how can I
package it?

Day 8 I visit the Easter market in Caen
Au marche de Pacques a Caen

I walk through the market to find
some Normand apples. But it's late
Easter afternoon and probably
everyone wants to go hunt
for eggs and play
with whatever the French
play with on Easter. The marche
is wrapping up. I get the apples.
On the way, I pass a bald man
being followed by an enormous
bubble. It pops and I am surprised
the little rainbow inside doesn't slick
his skin. Ah, Caen, qu'est-ce que tu me
satisfait, et bien je ne suis jamais satisfaite.

Day 9 I put together a Facebook found poem. I am only posting a few lines of this one.

Today it's market
research. I check my feed, see that a friend wants
to know why boys these days want the cake
but not the whole thing. I learn he doesn't give
pieces. 40 hours a week for three years, where
did you go? Every one of you was raw, unbridled
evil and greed and ignorance smothered in balloons
and ribbons. Let's hope we don't get blown away
by the wind.

Today, my poem is "At 25 years old I feel my breasts for the first time." And it probably won't go public yet, just so you know in advance.

NaPoMo Day 6 Poem

One touched up, the other catch-ups coming soon.

Some girls made brownies 
in their toy ovens. I baked 
little women. Every day 
in the back room, Full 
House, Step by Step, 
Family Matters, me 
and my army 
of dolls. My trays
could make six women 
at a time.  [To make a plastic 
  woman: 1. drip eye and lip 
  dye into grooves of the metal 
  tray. 2. Fill body with flesh 
  color (peach available now;
  more colors coming soon). 3. 
  Choose brown, yellow, or red,
  cipher hair dye into the depressions
  of her squared bob. 4. Insert silicon
  handled tray into oven. Bake women 
  until mom shouts about burnt plastic 
  smell. 5. Using other trays, cook separately
  the sarongs, sneakers, skirts and shirts to wrap
  around your women.]
How I loved 
the peel of them 
from metal, their cling
to those round grooves. 
If you want to bake
a woman, be careful. 
Pull her out too quick 
and an eye could tear.  Too 
slow and she may mangle.
Just remember, no matter
how many plastic women you have
made, they never stand unless propped. 

NaPoMo Day 4 & 5 Poems

Today I have two incomplete ones, but like I said in the beginning, I'm happier with some strong lines than trying to force out mediocre or bad poems.

100% American

and watching Obèses on TV. Back
home it's called Heavy, that passive
adjective, not like this obnoxious plural,
finger pointed at me. Me because
I have been heavy in all of its terminality
Yes, I've been every sort of heavy: heavy as old
books heavy as a swift rain heavy
like a bird flying or flying
into a window heavy like a goodbye.


The day I taught some poems

it rains on lycee victor hugo and there are plenty
of vocabulary questions. Each student reads a poem, plucks
word after word from the copy in his hands. They take Kinnell
and Clifton and Williams and Kenyon, swish their lines around
for the hour.

NaPoMo Day 2 & 3 Poems

Today I made my students poetry editors. I made them choose 4 out of 6 poems (from Lucille Clifton, William Carlos Williams, Jane Kenyon, Langston Hughes, and Galway Kinnell) to include in their literary journals. And they rocked it. They never stop impressing me, these kids.

As for my poems, here are two. One that I've been wanting to write since it snowed in February, and one that I wrote in Litt class today.


Caen sous la neige
On the castle in Caen: to your right a pigeon
lands on, flits off the roof. Straight ahead a man
and a young girl sled down the lawn. Left
of you a boy slips, then tries to play
it off like he was bending down to collect
a snowball, lets it fall through his fingers
when he realizes none of his friends were watching.

At the market: a few vendors knit
themselves into a close circle: a Normand
verger, a boulanger, the fish man, the man
with the beads. The only ones who brave
the sludge for us loyal shoppers, who will carry
our apples and our clementines home
carefully, pointing our feet first
and landing on saltless concrete.

That night you find out that in the right (moon)light
the snow can look like sand shaved with diamonds. Hear
their sprakling crunch beneath your feet.


Après « Education des jeunes filles aux États-Unis »

de Tocqueville, what don't you know
about us young American
women ? In a corner room
in New York, in Philly, in Chicago,
[doesn't matter where really ;
on est tous pareilles quand même]
you lift plume from ink
well. Go ahead, you grand
harmoniste. Harness
those words like you say
we hold our own reigns.
So you need some more
research time ? Spend
years in our pounding
chest, talk to as many jeunes
femmes as you can. And when
you're done, go ahead, give our dossier
to your Europe. I can't wait to feel
its corners, sharp and n'importe ou,
ready to slice any hands
that try to straighten these pages.

NaPoMo 2012 Day 1 Poem

Mourning Doves

I thought they were called morning
doves until I heard one day how their light
caw carries
carried
had carried
and I could hear
chest puffed and eyes clouding
how they mourn.
It wasn't until someone
was lost that I started to hear them
at dusk, or on a sunny after
noon above a family eating on the grass,
sometimes even in the gray night,
as I let a sharp wrap of February wind
carry me.

hello, march!

march came a little late this year, cause yesterday we had a little gift from the gods called leap year. among other ambitions, i want to start a lobby to make leap year a national holiday. actually, that probably already exists. when the fates give you an extra day once every four years, the last thing we should be doing is working!

speaking of ambitions, let's do a five-month check in on my goal progress!

1. Get healthy physically, mentally, spiritually: Getting there! I did a cleanse a while back that really balanced me out. I'm working yoga back into my schedule and now that it's nice out I can start running again! I've also been ab-ripping like a champ.

2. Run 5k nonstop by March (the 3k track is literally right outside my door): Officially failed. Because there's no way I'm going to be able to do this in 31 days. I'm going to revise this to the end of May.

3. Find yoga and do it at least weekly - I was on the wagon for a bit, but I fell off again =( But all is not lost! See number one.

4. Eat seasonally: Success! So much easier here.

5. See Germany: Going to Volksfest in May!

6. See south of France: Not sure this is going to happen. I think Giverny may be as far south as I can get. I had to budget and prioritize. The south has always been my dream to see, but I just couldn't make it work.

7. Perfect my french: On my way! Classes have been helping incredibly.

8. Cut down dairy/sugar consumption: Yes and yes. Dairy has been easiest to reduce, and sugar has been slow and steady.

9. Write poems weekly: Still unsuccessful. Lots of inspiration, but now I need to set aside time to actually write!

10. Try other forms of writing/arts: Got crafty on V-Day and am getting back into the book-making scene.

11. Create lessons that I can use later as a teacher: Coming along handsomely!

12. Save money: See south of france. I've made a budget and am sticking to it.

13. Make awesome friends (already cracking away at this one!): Done and done.

14. Talk to family as often as possible: No trouble there.

15. Translate some French poems: Been really focused on reading them, will translate when I'm inspired.

16. Complete National Poetry Month in April (write a poem a day): I don't know how this is going to be possible, but I'ma give it my best go!

17. Volunteer: Unfortunately, this one is gonna have to be let go. Well, unless you count the free English lessons I give to some of my friends!

18. Complete advanced degree of french studies: Immersed in classes right now, and when I finish I will have not one but two degrees!

19. Handmake Christmas presents: Executed and well-received!

So, getting there, though I've had some steep hills along the way. Is that even an expression?

call me ambitious

When else in my life am I going to have the chance to really focus on self-improvement? Let's face it, in the USA I never have time to create and reach goals for myself. Here, I work 12 hours a week, giving me plenty of time to travel, read, write, do whatever the heck I want, really. So, I present to you my goals for 2011-2012.

1. Get healthy physically, mentally, spiritually
2. Run 5k nonstop by March (the 3k track is literally right outside my door)
3. Find yoga and do it at least weekly
4. Eat seasonally
5. See Germany
6. See south of France
7. Perfect my french
8. Cut down dairy/sugar consumption
9. Write poems weekly
10. Try other forms of writing/arts
11. Create lessons that I can use later as a teacher
12. Save money
13. Make awesome friends (already cracking away at this one!)
14. Talk to family as often as possible
15. Translate some French poems
16. Complete National Poetry Month in April (write a poem a day)
17. Volunteer
18. Complete advanced degree of french studies
19. Handmake Christmas presents

This list was inspired by a photo I took last time I was in France of my goal list. And I realized I had done most of them:
1. Find yoga
2. Eat better
3. Walk 1/2 mile a day
4. Become fluent
5. Finish l'histoire de pi
6. Try 20 cheeses
7. See D-Day beaches
8. See Eiffel Tower
9. Go to England
10. Complete NaPoMo (intentionally not completed)
11. Write poem in French

Funny what changes in three years, what stays the same.

NaPoMo Day 30 Poem

So, I met my National Poetry Month goal at just about the same moment I found out Osama Bin Laden is dead. Weird.

This isn't the first NaPoMo that I have completed, but it is the first I feel really confident about. The photos were an awesome inspiration. Congrats, too, to fellow NaPoMoers Rach, Donna, and Kendall. Good show. Thanks for the prompts.



Photo from Black & WTF Photos:

We walk an elevated green field on the outskirts of a zoo in Cohanzick
for miles it feels
for seconds it feels
and on top of this hill
we come across a soccer goal
and inside the net is a panda.
We would like to play soccer
but how can you hit a panda
with a soccer ball? Peacocks
roam the brush up here and
we pass dried animal
ribs jaw teeth
we pass trash, stained orange,
tires bottles dolls that have
been washed again and again
by the mud.
We listen. The wind wisps
our hair. The peahen cries.
Remember the monkeys who
looked too human, the bear
who rested in a hammock
made of recycled fire
hose. Remember the chainsaw
art, the dingo who howled at
our smell. How do I blink
and you’re in uniform, approaching
the ball. Inside the net, the panda falls
onto his fluffed back. He is ready to catch.

NaPoMo Day 29 Poem

Photo from Black & WTF Photos:

A world without plastic
No tupperware to hold our leftover rice, no red solo
cup to drink our beer from at parties, to eat our cereal
from when our bowls our spoons are stacked dirty
in the sink. Without plastic, the snap of a new DVD
case doesn’t send your memory to the chalked desks
of fourth grade, the velcro latch on your trapper keeper.
In a world without plastic, our boots would be made
of rubber again, and they’d be everywhere: a woman
finds one floating in the sink next to the pestle;
somewhere a young boy hitches an old fireman’s
to his back and strides home, dreams future forming.
In a world without plastic rubber would make our bottles
our fake breasts our cheap picture frames our milk jugs
hopes future forming.

NaPoMo Day 30 Translation

La Grasse matinee*
Jacques Prévert
from Paroles
French version here

It’s terrible
the small sound of a hard egg broken on a pewter countertop
it’s terrible this noise
when it stirs the memory of the man who is hungry
it is also terrible, the head of this man
the head of this man who is hungry
when he looks at himself at six o clock in the morning
in the mirror of a department store
a head the color of dust
it’s not his head really that he looks at
in the window of Potin’s
he doesn’t care about his head the man
he doesn’t think about it
he dreams
he imagines another head
a calf’s head for example
with a vinegar sauce
or the head of whatever can be eaten
and it gently stirs his jaw
gently
and he gently grinds his teeth
for the world is paying its head
and he can do nothing against this world
and he counts on his fingers one two three
one two three
that makes three days that he hasn’t eaten
and he repeated to himself for three days
This can’t go on
this goes on
three days
three nights
without eating
and behind these windows
these pastes these bottles these reserves
dead fish protected by the boxes
boxes protected by the windows
windows protected by the cops
cops protected by fear
nothing but barricades for these six unhappy sardines
A little farther the bistro
creamed coffee and hot croissants
the drunk man
and inside his head
a fog of words
a fog of words
sardines to eat
hard egg creamed coffee
coffee sprinkled with rum
creamed coffee
creamed coffee
coffee sprinkled with blood!...
A man highly esteemed in his neighborhood
was murdered in broad daylight
the murderer the vagabond stole from him
two francs
to be a sprinkled coffee
seventy cents
two buttered tarts
and twenty-five cents for the tip for the boy
It’s terrible
the small sound of a hard egg broken on a pewter countertop
it’s terrible this noise
when it stirs the memory of the man who is hungry.

*La Grasse matinee is an expression for a lazy morning.

NaPoMo Day 29 Translation

Pater Noster
Jacques Prévert
from Paroles
French version here

Our father who art in heaven
Stay there
And we’ll stay here on earth
Which is sometimes so pretty
With its mysteries of New York
And then its mysteries of Paris
Which are well worth those of the trinity
With its small Ourcq canal
Its great wall of China
Its Morlaix river
Its foolishness of Cambrai
With its Pacific ocean
And its two docks at Tuileries
With its good children and bad subjects
With all the wonders of the world
Which are there
Simply on the earth
Offered to everyone
Scattered
Amazed themselves to be such wonders
And which don’t dare admit themselves
Like a pretty young nude girl doesn’t dare show herself
With the appalling horrors of the world
Which are legion
With their legioners
With their torturers
With the masters of this world
The masters with their priests their traitors their troopers
With the seasons
With the years
With the pretty girls and the old jerks
With the rush of misery rotting in the steel of cannons.

NaPoMo Day 27 Translation

I've seen several
Jacques Prévert
from Paroles
French version here

I saw one who was sitting on the hat
of another
he was pale
he trembled
he was waiting for something…doesn’t matter what
the war…the end of the world…
it was absolutely impossible for him to make a move or talk
and the other
the other who was looking for “his” hat was even paler
and he trembled also
and repeated himself nonstop
my hat…my hat
and he wanted to cry.
I saw one who read the newspapers
I saw one who saluted the flag
I saw one who was dressed in black
he had a watch
a watch chain
a wallet
the legion of honor
and a pince-nez
I saw one who led his child by the hand and shouted
I saw one with a dog
I saw one with a cane sword
I saw one who cried
I saw one who went into a church
I saw one who left it…

NaPoMo Day 26 Poem

Photo from Black & WTF Photos:

Central
At the center of the frame a man, taller than most, holds
hands with a short woman, and in his palm stands a miniature

man in a suit. At the center of a café at the center of a small
town the man in the palm thinks he is the center of everyone’s
world. But he’s in the right hand of the tall man which means

he’s a little to the left. The miniature thinks he is the tall man’s
right hand, but he’s just in it. The tall man at center is in a trench

coat and black top hat. His calves shift his weight, but he’s still
at the center of the short woman’s gaze. She’s his right hand

man. Her feet push pumps into the concrete,
which is at the center of two roads.

NaPoMo Day 26 Translation

The beautiful season
Jacques Prévert
from Paroles
French version here

Hungry* lost frozen
All alone without a dime
A sixteen year old girl
Standing still
Place de la Concorde
At noon the fifteenth of August

*Hungry is not really the right word here, but it's the closest thing we have in English to "a jeun," which means that someone has not yet eaten in the morning, after a long sleep.

NaPoMo Day 25 Poem

Photo from Black & WTF Photos:

Souvenir
We walk on the beach. The moon is shedding
orange light on the waves, in our pupils, across
the hulking clutch of the ferris wheel. You tell me
the science behind the harvest. We are dressed
in tangerine.

The moments only happen once. I know because
I had words like this tattoed on my shoulder
and side. You tell me about sediment transport
as I carve letters into a dune with a stick. I love
is a complete sentence. I don’t need a direct
object.

You know you know you know stories of men
who played music on trains, purple hearts
in the war, weird statues made of computer
parts, but you don’t know we don’t know
three years from now you will breathe
along my hips, half-dressed and still
curious, an orange peel on the ledge and tubas
blaring from the tracks.

NaPoMo Day 22-25 Translations

I'm rocking the poem a day challenge. I can feel it. My voice has really come into its own. I wish I could say the same for the translation a day challenge. But the more I try to translate poems, the more I realize I really can't at my level. The best I can promise is that I'll give you a general sense of the poem. I'm stoked to see how that will change as I keep learning more about this language.

Day 22
Where I’m going, where I’m from
Jacques Prévert
from La pluie et le beau temps
French version here

Where I’m going, where I’m from
Why I am soaked
Come on, you can see.
It’s raining.
The rain, it’s rain.
I’m going down, and then
And then that’s it.
Follow your path
Like I follow mine.
It’s for my pleasure
That I wallow in the mud.
The rain, it makes me laugh.
I laugh at everything and everything and everything.
If you cry easily
Go back home
Cry for yourself
But leave me
Leave me, leave me leave me, leave me.
I don’t want to hear the sound of your voice,
Follow your path
Like I follow mine.
The only man who I loved
it was you who killed him
Clubbed, trampled…
finished.
I saw his blood run
run into the creek
into the creek.
Follow your path
like I follow mine
The man who I loved
is dead, his head in the mud.
That I can hate you
hate you…it’s crazy…it’s crazy…it’s crazy
And you you wait on me,
you are too good for me,
way too good, believe me.

You are good…good like the rat keeper is good for the rat…
but one day…one day will come when the rat will bite you…
Follow your path,
good men…fine men.


Day 23
Memory
Jacques Prévert
from La pluie et le beau temps
French version here

Twenty years after one hundred years later
still the sordid musketeers
still the same swashbucklers
still the carriers of the banner
Child I saw an image
of men in black clothes with a green face
standing around a man named Ferrer
Oh poor living men
how you have tough adversaries
still the same without one change
oh unhappy executioners
similar to those before.


Day 24
Familiar
Jacques Prévert
from La pluie et le beau temps
French version here

The mother does the knitting
The son goes to war
She finds this all natural the mother
And the father what is he doing the father?
He does business
His wife the knitting
His son the war
He his business
Hi finds this all natural the father
And the son and the son
What does he find the son?
He doesn’t find anything absolutely nothing the son
The son his mother does the knitting his father his business he the war
When he has finished the war
He will do business with his father
The war goes on the mother goes on she knits
The father goes on he does his business
The son is killed he doesn’t go on anymore.
The father and the mother go to the cemetery
They find this all natural the father and the mother
Life continues life with knitting the war business
Business the war the knitting the war
Business business business
Life with the cemetery.

Day 25
At the florist's
Jacques Prévert
from La pluie et le beau temps
French version here


A man enters a florist's
and chooses flowers
the florist wraps the flowers
the man put his hand in his pocket
to get some money
money to pay for the flowers
but at the same time he puts
suddenly
his hand on his heart
and he falls

At the same time that he falls
the money rolls on the ground
and then the flowers fall
at the same time as the man
at the same time as the money
and the florist stays there
with the money that rolls
with the flowers that rot
with the man who dies
obviously all this is very sad
and she has to do something
the florist
but she doesn’t know how to take it
she doesn’t know
what to start with

There are so many things to do
with this man who died
and these flowers that rot
and this money
this money that rolls
that won’t stop rolling.

NaPoMo Day 24 Poem

Photo from Black & WTF Photos:

Another personal one. Not ready to share the whole thing, but here's an excerpt. Happy Easter!

Lady, there’s a lion in your lap
You and I know he is always going
to go for the feather in your hat. Paws
will dirty your skirts. You can keep
this lion, lady, but not on your lap.

NaPoMo Day 23 Poem

Photo from Black & WTF Photos:


April: thinking of rain
after Jane Kenyon
First, the slick drop on my window,
the mist through the screen. I remember
we had a bird in a cage. My brother and I
would set it outside as we ran around
the yard. Grass crunched, flowers bloomed.
Sometimes he would chase me with a toy
gun. Most days, I am the bird.
When it rains, I feel like the cage.

NaPoMo Day 22 Poem

Photo from Black & WTF Photos:

Nude woman talks to a skeleton
Skeleton you are
my friend. Look
what you have
achieved. Shed
muscle and sinew,
cartilage and skin,
until you’ve only
curves of rib, jaw,
spine. You did it
skeleton, but you
are rusted now,
because it is raining
and because you have
nothing on your
person. How silly
you would look
carrying an umbrella.
Skeleton, if you insist
on being only a
skeleton, I wish
you would wear
some clothes.

NaPoMo Day 21 Poem

Photo from Black & WTF Photos:

Amateurs
Here’s an elderly couple, upset with a boy for clapping
between thunder and lightning flash. It distracts the raven,
they say. It won’t bring the storm inside.

He knows they are crazy. Knew it since he saw them grasping
the wire fence at his game. He went with them for the thrill.

They do this on Sundays. Find someone willing to play, pay
if they must. Last week it was a hippie at the beach – dread
locks twisted beneath a paisley bandana – they posed him
with a tiger cub and plums shining on hooks.

The couple is not looking for a certain aesthetic. They want
only to capture something unique. A suited boy stroking
a raven, the antlers heavy on his head; a young mother
in a tutu licking grains of salt from between her fingers,

or most recently, themselves, spooning oatmeal at dinner,
mixing mixing until the berries swirl color in their bowls.

In their spoons, hummingbirds. In their cups, cotton. They still
can’t get the shot. So they wait for the image that rounds
their lips. The one that contracts their pupils.