the birth of a poem

by doreen peri

Posted to Action Poetry on 2004-03-13 18:47:00

Parent message is 619515
you know when it’s long overdue
when the concepts slip through
shaded rude uncashed in revenues
during the moments between blue
nights, during the very few
minutes before light makes morning new
as dreams undo perfumed pillowcases
and night is subjected to the erases
of minutes.

it is then when a poem comes –
it is then when a stanza breaks
and drums take over – it is then
when your lover becomes words,
the absurdities clear, when all held dear
erupts like fragmented misery, when
you can steer free verse nearer to rhyme,
nearer to a time when then becomes now,
nearer to a vow spoken to honor earth,
nearer to the birthright of a soul immersed
in time nursed by unspoken dangled vagaries
which plague the very nature of the rental space
we all take up.

you know when it’s long overdue
when the stuff, the residue, the ash,
the cashed in trash you so very much want to state
is served up on a plate you can’t quite hold,
when the cold vision of a mission is stolen
from a stun gun blasted into a vast new space,
when you need to trace your fingertips along
the inside out song you only imagined being written,
when the lyric is projected as syllable inflections
and without intention, without plan, without being able
to stabilize colors or spans of time, or cries or wishes
or vistas or goddamn mists which frequent dreams,
since none of it is what it ever seems, it is then when
you know it is long overdue.
it is then when you take to
an attempt to capture,
to trap, to ensure a pure
fragrance, to grab the vagrancy
of thought and make it known that it is caught now
in a stanza or an image permenantly recorded.
stored on particle linen with the nub of a pen
or in an electronic file to prove you soothed
the ruse by witness.

a poem is born
when morning grieves
cease to mourn, when
leaves turn up to catch
the vast reign
of plain
thought
until what was what
is taught how well
it is to tell
of the fight
to write.

and if you’ve fought the light,
and if you’ve caught the rainbow
in a phrase or played with verbs
to help a reader hear through your eyes,
and see your breath upon their ears,
than touch becomes
a dear treasure, the
measure measured by
a foothold in grounded guess.

the rest, after the dawn,
the rest, after putting up the good fight
to ignite a candle on another dawn
makes it all worthwhile.

it is the call
of a morning glory
opening to a hummingbird
story sucking life from
the stamen,
no matter how vile
the pistol, no matter
how difficult to retrieve
memory.

the birth of a poem
needs no excuse or explanatory invective.
it is the opening of legs letting out
life.