In a dream the children were all jumping rope and skipping hopscotch while singing the following song,a song they had constructed, I’d guessed, from overheard snatches of their parents nightly conversations: “Donald Trump, Donald Trump, go away. In the dump, in the dump, you should stay. The 25th amendment, we should invokeI’d buy some shitContinue reading “#742: Political Jump Rope, April 7”
Tag Archives: A poem a day for a month
#741: J is for Jacklin, Julia
Somehow Joe Jackson snuck in frontof Julia Jacklin in the stacks. One of my favoriterecords of 2022, Julia Jacklin’s Pre-Pleasure is a mellow, moody mix of singer-songwriter goodness, smart, evocative, sometimes funnylyrics and Julia’s soft but rich singing voice.“Lydia Wears A Cross,” the album opener, is a vivid study of children in church and allContinue reading “#741: J is for Jacklin, Julia”
#740: The Post Office Guy Asks Me To Wait
I wait in line to shipnine paperback books to nine different addresses in the United States, media rate. The Post Office guy begins stamping and affixing bar code stickers and postage paid stickers on to my packages and he gets about threepackages in and he says to me, a line is starting to form andContinue reading “#740: The Post Office Guy Asks Me To Wait”
#738: Hate Is A Pretty Strong Word
From the letters of Charles Darwin: “Oh my God how do I hate species & varieties.” “I am very tired, very stomachy & hate nearly the whole world.” “I am very poorly today & very stupid & hate everybody & everything.” “I hate myself, I hate clover, and I hate bees.” “I amContinue reading “#738: Hate Is A Pretty Strong Word”
#735: The Teacher, April 3, 2026
The Teacher, April 3, 2026 Tries to stop his studentsfrom thinking. Tries to inspireall manner of bad habits. Encourages errors of every stripe and color. Stop endingyour sentences with a period, he says. Use the passive voicewhenever possible and spellingthese days is overrated. Verb tenseagreement is passé and who everheard of a question mark.There’s no reason for learning toContinue reading “#735: The Teacher, April 3, 2026”
#733: A Memory Poem on April 2, 2026
Once, as a grade schooler, my father and my uncle took me out on a boat into the oceanfor deep sea fishing. Worriedthat I might get sick, my fathergave me a Dramamine. I remember crawling into theboat’s cabin and sleepingthrough the entire fishing trip. When I woke, long after the boat had come back to dock, I remember feeling peevedthat IContinue reading “#733: A Memory Poem on April 2, 2026”
#731: A Tanka on April 1st, 2026
Happy April 1, the first day of National Poetry Month, and for those who participate, National Poetry WRITING Month, or NaPoWriMo for short. I find myself in a little bit of a pickle. If you’ve been reading my almost daily work here on the blog, you will know that I am writing poem-like-things about eachContinue reading “#731: A Tanka on April 1st, 2026”
#577: DMV Meditation
The line is three blocks long, people waiting to get into the DMV. I’m in this line half an hour before opening, and even when the doors open and the line begins to move, the wait is interminable. The old woman in front of me, who can barely stand, is cheerful, wants to chat. I amContinue reading “#577: DMV Meditation”
#576: Ode to Andy
Somewhat of a recluse,stopped touring in the 80son the brink of your heyday,debilitating anxiety tookyou forever off the stagebut not from the studio,thanks be. Skylarking, a masterpiece, found youworking and fighting with Todd Rundgren to make the greatest record of the decade, for me, perhaps, the greatest of all time. I don’t knowa whole lotContinue reading “#576: Ode to Andy”
#575: There Is A Ritual To It
The dance floor is open, she says, and people begin dancing. Sometimes, she doesn’t have to say anything. From the first downbeat people leave their seatsand flock. They don’t even haveto be sure that the music is good. It starts, they begin, as if they could not help it. They are exercising, they areentertaining themselves,Continue reading “#575: There Is A Ritual To It”
michael jarmer 