A little different direction.

Okay, for this one, I start with a sonnet, followed by a quatrain.  I don't know why I did this, but it came out okay, so I kept it.  I'm still wondering about the quatrain,  but that's the way I wrote it, so it's staying.  Again, I do occasionally do rhymed poetry.  I used to do it a lot, but came the realization that most people now, (at least the people who are publishing poetry) have no use for it at all.  I remember getting into a discussion about this with a friend, and I told him that most of the really good poetry being written now is set to music.  It all rhymes, and flows, and has recognizable meter, etc.  There are other techniques being used, such as metaphor, simile, etc. also.  Anyway, here it is:

He stares

He stares out solemnly into the night
seeing nothing, feeling less, hearing sounds
He scans the darkness while seeking the light
held tightly in check by too-human bounds
Where is the sudden illumination
the answers to the questions never asked
somewhere in the inner rumination
he was bound to an impossible task
He looked into the depths of his soul
and did a completely thorough inspection
he searched the entire width of the whole
and found there only his own reflection
Is this all there is, he asked in wonder
there must have been a terrible blunder

Little ego burning bright
crouching low in quivering fright
what a poor, poor pitiful sight
hiding there beneath the light

Copyright 2010 Carl Thames

Slacking? Nope.

I wasn't slacking yesterday, I was wiped out.  On Saturday, I went over 500 miles, and it took 11 hours to do it.  Lot of sitting in the car, broken by brief moments of hard physical labor.  I know, I have been convinced that Manual Labor was the President of Mexico, but it's not.  Trust me on that one.  Anyway, knowing that at least two people read this thing on a regular basis, I decided I'd better get busy and put something new on here.  I like that.  Thank you.  You are motivating me to write more.  This one came from the same place the other ones did, only again it's a bit darker.  I write a lot about uncertainty.  I don't think any of us get any kind of guarantee of certainty, and I'm reacting badly to that.  Part of that is age, I think.  As I get older, I become more resistant to change, while at the same time I realize that changes are happening faster and faster.  It's already nearly the end of August.  It feels like yesterday was the 4th of July.  The day before that was New Years Day.  I guess I'll do like the rest and emulate the duck.  We see the calm, placid appearance on the surface, while underneath he's paddling like mad to try to get somewhere....

Do Your Duty!

All my life I've been destroyed
beginning from the first
curiosity dashed, questions ignored
molded into a formlessness
Do your duty!

My soul keeps screaming
there is someone in here
the world laughs quietly
it's somewhere in where?
Do your duty!

Life is a whole of disjointed parts
each part playing it's role
without knowing it's lines
on a stage of quicksand
Do your duty!

I run my race hobbled
cheered on by faces I trust
behind hands that secure the binds
I'm not allowed to quit
Do my duty!

C 2011 C. Thames

Yet another day?

It seems like the days are passing like a long walk lately.  One after the other, like one foot after the other.  They're not unpleasant, and they seem to have a goal, or destination.  Yet with each step, we find ourselves closer to the end, whatever that is.  In my case, I hope that it's another beginning place.  For the first time in a long time, I'm actively engaged in something that is going to lead to something else.  Maybe I'm just more conscious of it?  I'm working on a Master's degree in Counseling.  I am half-way through the program now, and have just as far to go as I've already come.  At times it seems amazing, at other, kind of an "eh" feeling.  I am enjoying the process, with the minor exception of the statistics class.  I didn't enjoy that very much, but it's interesting in that when I finished, I briefly considered going back and taking more math classes.  I may do that, after I finish this degree.  There is an elegance in numbers, and I feel a distinct lack in not being able to do them.  I now understand why my sons both like math.  I've always been a word person, and have always done better with words than numbers.  I think if I get more into numbers, it could round me out a bit.  I don't think I'm going to put up a poem with this post, just rambling.  Maybe later today?

Another question

I notice with several of my poems that I keep asking pretty much the same question.  It may seem important, but I'm now starting to ask just how relevant it really is.  I do like this poem, though.  I like the play on words, but again, I tend to have a favorite word for a while.  This period of time appeared to be "apart."  I like it because it's made up of the "a" and "part" which means belonging to, and yet together they mean the opposite.

Lying here


lying here, looking up
staring at the stars
feeling kinship
they are alone
one star, then another
apart, of the whole

I reach out to them
they are so far away
everyone sees them
you promise they are real
those stars
beyond touch
am I?


c. 2010 Carl Thames

In reading this again, I'm once again asking if I'm reachable, or even real.  That's always a question.  Have I distanced myself from the general flow of society so much that I'm no longer approachable?  I see evidence of that.  The curious thing is that I'm not sure that it bothers me.  I'm a lot more hesitant to make new friends now.  While I tell myself that I'm open to a romantic relationship, I'm not doing anything about achieving that.  I guess I'll just see what happens.

Make a better world?

I've heard since I was in high school that I needed to be a force for change, to do my part in making this a better world.  For the most part, I believe that.  We all have an obligation to do something to make this world a better place.  I know that doesn't seem like an attitude that's shared much any more, but it's out there.  It's way too easy to get caught up in our own lives and our own desires and completely ignore the rest of humanity.  Then there are those who have no interest whatever in improving anything other than their own personal situation.  I can understand that.  It just seems really, really small to me.  Don't misunderstand.  If you're in a lousy situation, you need to do what you can to change it.  The thing is that most people aren't in that bad a situation.  Most of us are just plugging along, doing what we do.  Anyway, I decided one day to write about it, so here it is.

Be a Force for Change


Be a force for change
that's what they said
I was supposed to do
all the way through school
Make your mark on the world
aspire to greatness
what a laugh
The people who told me to change
the world, won't
not the world,
not even themselves


Copyright 2010 Carl Thames

All we have to do now is to not take on their attitude, right?  We can do SOMETHING to make this world better.  All we have to do is decide to do it.

Are you there? Am I here?

I feel like I'm not being treated fairly.  At this stage in my life, I should have some certainty.  That seemed to be the promise.  When I was young, everything I read and heard was that if you wait long enough, you will find out what you need to know.  Well, it's not happening.  The older I get, the less I'm certain about.  Things that I thought I knew for sure are turning out to be just another delusion.  Things I thought I could count on are turning out to be less sure than some of the fantasy stuff.  Right now, I can stand in the middle of the woods and direct dial Australia and talk to someone there as if they were standing next to me.  It's incredible.  If I have a question, I can hop on the computer and within minutes have an answer.  I can't be sure it's the right answer, but I will have an answer.  Our access to information is incredible.  The problem is that it doesn't come with knowledge.  We can have pedantry, but we can't have knowledge.  The difference is that we can have the facts, but we can't be sure we know how those facts fit in with everything else.  Anyway, I did one that sort of fits this, so here it is.

My Life

There are times when my life
feels like the moon shining on calm water
I can see it clearly
but I know it's not really there


Copyright 2010 Carl Thames

What's real?

Okay, so I get philosophical now and then.  The problem is that I don't have the logical kind of mind to really do it right, but it's fun to play anyway.  I actually hunted down and read Rene Descartes at one time.  I tried to read Kant, but the guy writes like a German.  Forget Hume.  Anyway, I get in these moods and I like to think about why we are who and what we are.  I know, that's pretty dangerous, and I should learn to just shut up and live, but I got hung up on the saying "The unexplored life isn't worth living."  That's basically nonsense but again, I'm not all that logical at times.  When I get too illogical, I start making weird associations, and when I do that, sometimes poetry results.  I should be talking more about what constitutes poetry, but for this first bit, I just want to get some of it out there.  Debate among yourselves whether it's really poetry or not.

It was Real

Are there earthquakes on the moon?

Does the ground shake and move

or is it solid, not made of pieces

like our earth, in little squares

The ground here fits like a puzzle

one piece jammed into another

nothing solid about it

although we like to think it is

Does Mars have earthquakes?

I think it probably does

named after the God of war

it would be appropriate there

Or Venus, after the goddess of love

earthquakes would make sense there too

Only they would start from the center

not the surface like they do here

Here just the surface shakes

as the pieces move around

like the moves the silly humans make

dropping bombs all over the ground

or bouncing from one love to another

nothing is ever always

we feel the shake and convince ourselves

it was real, but it was then

The moon would probably shake it's head

if it had one, watching what was going on

seeing the pieces move around

with silly humans thinking they don't

Copyright 2010 Carl Thames

I'm not totally happy with the rhyming in the fifth stanza, but I don't want to change anything as it describes what I wanted to say.  Damn words anyway. I did another repeat in this one, with "silly humans" and I didn't even realize I'd done it until I posted, then read the post to see how it looked.  Hmmm, I'm usually a better editor than that.  Oh well, I think it fits, so it's staying.

Update

I just added a sign in thing.  I don't know for sure what it does, but it seemed like a good thing to add.  This site will morph gradually, as I figure stuff out.  Thanks Karen for the nudge.  I'll try to add some more stuff later today.

Why do it?

I ask myself constantly why I want to write, and specifically why I want to write poetry.  I've never fully understood it.  There are times, not frequently any more, when the urge is almost overwhelming.  I can remember when I was younger, when I would HAVE to write something, in order to stay sane.  Not that I regard sanity as all that it's cracked up to be.  Someone said that to be fully adjusted to an insane world is NOT a sign of mental health, and I believe it.  The world is a mess, the concept of a relationship usually involves a computer now, and nobody talks face-to-face if they can avoid it.  I'm not sure if that's a matter of choice or a matter of available time, though.  Everyone is so busy doing things now.  It's like nobody can stop for a few minutes and talk, because if they do, they'll be late for the next thing they have to do.  I guess I'm very lucky in that regard that I'm taking my retirement in the middle.  As soon as I finish school, I plan to get a job and hold it until they carry me out of it.  In the meantime, I'm going to continue to write, although I'm not doing a great job of that.  Most of the stuff I'm posting here was written in the past.  I'll run out of it soon, and have to start creating again.  I know we're all looking forward to that. 

I was in a pretty weird mood when I wrote this one.  Let me know what you think.

A hot loaf of poet

Lemme have a hot loaf of poet

steaming, if you have one

nothing satisfies like a fresh one

right out of the oven

He was from so far down south

he was up to here with it

full of ya'll and yes'um's

dripping off him like bird shit

he'd appreciate a hunk too

you don't slice bread, you break it

like you break poets

uneven, unleavened, unclean

take a hunk of poet

dip it in some butter

or gravy, or anything

improve the taste some

better to bake it fresh

eat it hot out of the pan

add a sprig of honeysuckle

stuffed up your nose

copyright 2010 Carl Thames

Words

Have you ever ran across a word that sounded like what it meant?  I do that on occassion, an usually spend a day or so with the word, running through my mind.  I savor it, let it rumble around for a bit.  Now and then I use it.  That's what happened with this one.

Jangled


Jangled nerves
that's a great word
it sounds like it feels
too much coffee
not enough something else

too much life
25 hours a day
of nothing much, really
talk about a waste
of timelessness

copyright 2010 C. Thames

What it is.

I have decided to just write here.  I'm not going to go for the ad thing where I can make money from this, or whatever.  That's not why I started this blog.  I want to put into words some of the stuff I'm dealing with.  The main problem, as is with most people, is this thing called life getting in the way of what we want to do.  Granted, my life is probably less intrusive in that regard.  I have a steady source of income, although it's barely adequate.  The important thing there is that it IS adequate, and I'm clinging to that.  I'm heading in the direction I want to go, and will become what I have been for most of my life in several years.  That sounds oxymoronic, and to a point it is.  I am studying to be a counselor.  I've done it for most of my life, and have actively sought out opportunities to help other people.  This class is good, though.  I'm learning how to help people without putting myself in jeopardy in some way.  I needed this thirty years ago.  Okay, maybe forty years ago. 

What does that have to do with poetry?  Everything, in my opinion.  Poetry, for me, is the essence of the thing.  You can lie in poetry, and many people do, but to me that defeats the purpose of it.  For me, it's like a Buddhist thing, where you get beyond the mundane, the routine, whatever, and get to what really matters.  That attitude brings its own problems, though.  What really matters?  Who gets to decide?  Then, add in the possibility of assuming another persona in the poem, and it gets really confusing.  One of my strong points is my ability to put myself into someone else's shoes.  I have the ability to feel what others feel in certain situations.  Now that I've written that, I have to question if it's real, or just another delusion.  I think it's real, because I am able to connect with other people, and in order to do that you have to be able to relate.  In order to relate, you need to be able to share, and the only way you can share is to know the feelings involved.  The purpose of poetry is to allow others into the space that contains those feelings or experiences.  I differentiate because two people can share an experience and come away with completely different feelings.  Maybe if I share an experience of sitting beside a lake, or the experience of standing in a pasture, eating grass and looking down a nearby road, it will pass along some kind of kindred feeling.  (Oh, you thought I was just talking about human feelings?)  Who knows.  I know I like to do it, so I do. Here's one I wrote one day when I was feeling mostly lack, but not totally. 

Empty Lot of Nothing

There's an empty lot
of nothing over there
a few blades of grass
some trash
but mostly nothing

Can you hear it calling?
What does it want from you?
Could be a social project
turn it into something
other than what it is

It seems fullfilled, an odd word
it just is, and in it's is-ness
fullfills us
it's not used
up to nothing

Leave it
but not alone
it's a place
empty in it's existence
it's how I know it.

c. 2011 C. Thames

Follow up

It took me a minute to find the poem I was talking about.  Sometimes the titles don't ring the right bell and I have to open them and read them to make sure it's the one I was really looking for.  (I know, ending a sentence with a proposition is a no-no, but it's the way I talk, so there it is.)  Anyway, here it is.

Feet blind

Blow me, wind
blow me down
a path my past doesn't know
somewhere new
that doesn't know me either

We can learn each other
I can find your rocks and thorns
and share them with you
and make them new to you

You can find me, maybe
stumbling down you
head up, feet blind
falling and getting up

Moving to a new place
that I can make old again
just like the old new place
I fell over, feet blind

It was such a nice place
green grass, blue sky, clear water
and I rejoiced, and sang
and danced until

the grass was mud
the sky was black
the water a murky brown
and it was old again

Copyright 2010 Carl Thames


I'm not that crazy about using the words "feet blind" twice, but I couldn't think of a better way to describe the situation that occurs in the second usage, so I left it.  I do like playing with words.

Oh. Yeah.

I am supposed to post here, I guess.  What's the point of having a blog if you don't post to it, right?  Anyway, I did want to put up some more of my poetry, which was the whole point of the blog in the first place, so I should get busy. 


Time is of the essense
   of what?
What time is the right time
  for anything now?
It comes, it changes, it goes
Everything was just fine then
  at least what we remember
     of the good parts
Nothing is ever as good
  as it was back then
  when we had so many
      tomorrows

I'm not really sure what I feel about this one.  It seems a little maudlin on the surface, but it does capture the feeling I had at the time.  I was sitting in the student commons, looking at the young people there.  I do that at times, and it brings up some weird stuff.  I'm older then they are, (56) and I've been where many of them want to go.  Some of those places I've been were nice, many weren't.  The main thing is that NONE of them were what I expected them to be. 

Being older than most of the people around you brings a blessing and a curse.  The blessing is that you now know how to handle a lot of those situations that they are heading toward, and the curse is that you can't go back and do that.  We are all on our own path, and that path does contain some rocks and brambles.  I did a poem about that too.  I guess I should post it as well.  I'll go find it.

The Blog Title

It's only fitting that I post the poem that gave me the title for the blog.  I'm still figuring out how this thing works, so bear with me for a bit.  Okay, let's see if it works this time:

Broke Brain Fool

Broke brain fool writing down words

he don't know what they mean

he picks them up by the dozen

scatters them on a page

like he thinks he knows what he's doing

he thinks he's going to touch somebody

reach into a place they can't get to

themselves because they're too busy

at whatever busy-ness they're doing

so he gets busy writing down words

he don't know what they mean

to anybody else

Copyright 2010 Carl Thames

Hello All, and Welcome!

I decided to start a poetry blog.  Why?  I think the best explanation of the reason would be summed up pretty well with the phrase, "Lack of better sense."  Why else would I want to put some of my poetry out there, along with various related musing, for the entire world to critique?  A big part of it is that I want to start writing more, and if I have a blog to post to, maybe it will be enough of an incentive to just do it.  I want to write more poetry, and I want to talk about poetry.  You're more than welcome to comment.  If I like your comment, I'll post it.  Sometimes I'll post it even if I don't like it.  That may sound counter-productive, but to me, poetry is about honesty.  You won't see many epic poems here, because I think poems should be a snapshot of an emotion.  If I want a larger picture, I will write a short story or a novel.  Poetry is about right now.  When I'm writing them, I try to get my personal self out of the way and let the feeling flow through to the end of the pen, or in this case, to the keyboard.  I hope you enjoy it, or at least get something out of it.  We shall see.