The leaves came into the oak trees todayand I almost missed it. I looked up andin a moment they sprouted into fullbloom as if on cue. This was no time lapsetrick of technology, no, just my eyesdeciding that they should turn up the gazeskyward to the tops of these gloriousbeings. And, Christ, I almost missedContinue reading “#523: The leaves came into the oak trees today…”
Tag Archives: sonnet
#521: Sonnet for Project MA
Over the last year and a half or so, I have rediscovered the joy of it, the making of music with a good friend, a friend I had not seen for twenty-five years. From three thousand miles away, he’d begin.He’d send me these tracks, a bass and a click, some keyboard flourishes, and I’d importthemContinue reading “#521: Sonnet for Project MA”
#520: A Sonnet in Response to Anthony Fantano’s Review of “The Tortured Poets Department” by Taylor Swift, Written in the Second Person, in Service of the Concluding Couplet, and Not to Hide the Fact that I Liked the Record
You try not to be influenced by him;he’s smart, knowledgeable, a bit verbose, but often he’s critical of things you like,and mostly, mostly, you’re okay with that. But his bad review of the new Tay Tay made you doubt your own sense of what is good, made you think you had drunk of the Kool-Aid.HisContinue reading “#520: A Sonnet in Response to Anthony Fantano’s Review of “The Tortured Poets Department” by Taylor Swift, Written in the Second Person, in Service of the Concluding Couplet, and Not to Hide the Fact that I Liked the Record”
#519: I am not waving, but drowning
(after Stevie Smith) I am not waving, but drowning, and youkeep waving, like an idiot savant,when all I need now is a rescue line, a rope, a tube, anything that will float.Don’t you walk away; I’m not quite dead yet, the water has not yet entered my lungsand I am still gasping my last breathswhileContinue reading “#519: I am not waving, but drowning”
#518: Sonnet After Beers, with Laundry
The washer and the dryer now sing songswhen the cycle is done, and I don’t knowwhy that was a necessary feature, as if it’s not enough to hear them stop. I’m doing laundry in the basement nowafter having had a few I.P.A.sand exhausted late night YouTube views ofcomedy shows and the most recent newsall concerningContinue reading “#518: Sonnet After Beers, with Laundry”
#515: There’s No Better Place
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. William Shakespeare, sonnet 18 My brother says that our brother in-lawis in a better place, but I hold in my tongueand resist to say out loud what I believe, that there is no better place, unlessContinue reading “#515: There’s No Better Place”
#514: Sonnet about that Contractor
I don’t think about him very often now. What’s done is done and we like the results. Some litigation would have been costlyand there’d be no guarantee of winning. So we filed a complaint against the guyand knew that was the best that we could do. He left a lot of unhappy people in hisContinue reading “#514: Sonnet about that Contractor”
#512: 40 Poems Down
April they say, is the cruellest month–actually that’s what T.S. Eliot says, or wrote; he’s dead now, of course. But he probably didn’t know that at some point, his line would inspire someone somewhere to declare April as ourNational Poetry Month, which is onlycruel when you consider the poorsuckers who decide to write a poemeveryContinue reading “#512: 40 Poems Down”
#509: I am hunted by the notebook… (turn haunted into hunted)
I am hunted by the notebookI lost after sitting at my mother’s deathbed nearly seven years ago now; while I watched and I waited, I wroteabout the experience of being with her while she was dying. She wasnot aware I was even there. For somereason, days or weeks later, that bookwhere I had written allContinue reading “#509: I am hunted by the notebook… (turn haunted into hunted)”
#508: I watch my son play the snare drum…
At home here in Milwaukie, Oregon,I watch my son play the snare drum; he’s inDayton, Ohio for the Winter GuardInternational World Championshipand I’m watching on a tiny iPhone in the green back yard with the two tired dogs.His mother, my wife, has coached this young groupof musicians to regional championsand now she’s taken my sonContinue reading “#508: I watch my son play the snare drum…”
michael jarmer 