tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21811332475424134382024-03-14T09:05:09.506-06:00Penning The Pageeduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.comBlogger33125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-766538264506235592013-05-08T11:40:00.000-06:002013-05-08T11:40:13.253-06:00Caution: Here Be Stories <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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This morning I had breakfast at the <a href="http://patiopancakeplace.com/">local diner</a>, on the
highway. It’s been ages since I've eaten there. Six years at least, I reckon.
As I imagine is the case with any town or city, there are layers of residents
here. From the get-go, it’s been farmers and ranchers, with miners thrown in, later
on. Most recently, it’s become
something of an artists’ hub; and even more recently, a rafting, skiing, biking mecca.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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My first job here was at one of the chain burger places on
the highway (within spittin’ distance of where I ate this morning). It was a
solid introduction to old-timer/native residents of town. Those who had lived
here longer than I’d been alive, and who typically did the hard physical labor
I hoped, and still hope I never have to do. They’d seen quite a bit, the booms
and busts, and were therefore not easily swayed by any shifty and surely
temporary winds of change.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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But after three years of working there, I got a job at the
local <a href="http://coffeewithaltitude.com/index.php?main_page=salida_cafe">coffee shop</a> (since gone under, regrettably), which hosted a totally
different clientele: the bronze and toned jocks/jockettes, trustifarians, and
those coming here until moving on to the next OUTSIDE-accoladed hipster locale
on their bucket list. From there, until currently, I’ve worked in the hospital
kitchen, where I don’t see patients/clientele, but the staff does tend moreso
toward the coffee house crowd of my previous job.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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This morning, at the diner, I saw more than several folks whom I’d served back during my BurgerLand days. Along with
the seeing of them came some of their stories: the rancher who is on constant
lookout for 1946 pennies, since that’s the year he was born; the other rancher
who was eating with his wife—his brother is married to her sister; the long-ago-retired attorney, who was later joined by his second wife (who also left ten
minutes before he did)—he’d send monthly checks to his first wife, writing
“Maintenance” on the Memo line, and she’d cross it out, writing, “Alimony”
before depositing them. (These years, decades, farther along, that trophy wife
isn’t looking much the trophy. Also, more than just eating on opposite sides of
their booth’s table, they also sat at opposite ends.)<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
I put down the book-to-be-reviewed I was reading for the
local monthly ‘<a href="http://cozine.com/">zine</a>, and began taking notes of my remembrances. “There be
characters and stories, here,” I told myself.<o:p></o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment-->eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-886035351784103992013-04-30T20:45:00.000-06:002013-04-30T20:45:02.819-06:00Love in Leadville
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<br />
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<br /></div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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Lookit you there, Honeylamb<o:p></o:p></div>
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Your cap and gown and polished Ropers<o:p></o:p></div>
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You’d thought this day would never come<o:p></o:p></div>
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And now it’s fixin’ to be behind you<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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Don’t need to tell you the big old world’s<o:p></o:p></div>
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Sittin’ right outside our city limits<o:p></o:p></div>
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‘Cause you’ve been itchin’ to bust beyond ‘em<o:p></o:p></div>
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Since about the time you arrived within ‘em<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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But before you stretch those wings of yours<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And fly away into those other calling skies<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There’s something I need to tell you<o:p></o:p></div>
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For when life clips those wings of yours<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Love in Leadville’s <o:p></o:p></div>
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Gonna be there littl’ darlin’<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Love in Leadville’s <o:p></o:p></div>
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Gonna git ya through<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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You’ve got a big ol’ open heart<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And though he’d never fess up to it<o:p></o:p></div>
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That’s the heart you got from you old man<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But as the saying goes, The bigger they are…<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The world is looking for hearts like yours<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Looking perhaps for something that they’ve lost<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Or maybe instead something that they can’t have<o:p></o:p></div>
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Either way, know I’ll be holding your heart in mine<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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But don’t go thinking your heart will be all alone<o:p></o:p></div>
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Even though honest hearts can be hard to find<o:p></o:p></div>
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They’re out there for sure, perhaps looking for you<o:p></o:p></div>
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Rest assured it’s not always a heartless world<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Love in Leadville’s <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Gonna be there littl’ darlin’<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Love in Leadville’s <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Gonna git ya through<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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By now you know family reaches farther than blood<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And that it sometimes brings in together<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What on the surface seems the strangest of placements<o:p></o:p></div>
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For love and family have reasons of their own<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So it’s not just your Pa and me, your little sisters<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Who’ll be missing you, thinking of your, and praying<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It’ll be this whole entire town doing all that and more<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This whole entire town will be aching while you’re gone<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But there still remains that big old world outside<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
All those scads of folks who you’ve never met<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Who don’t yet realize it’s you they’ve been waiting for<o:p></o:p></div>
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So many wonders await you, so many families too<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Love in Leadville’s <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Gonna be there littl’ darlin’<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Love in Leadville’s <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Gonna git ya through<o:p></o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment-->eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-71542853335005140912013-04-29T21:29:00.005-06:002013-04-29T21:29:38.028-06:00Is It The Same Love?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQAyWwsnKArkWP5inZy702BkpV-JIovRommiTfPGz-b-yKZknZ0mWsw-73sOTbdxwtRM09Tdo4eShdjPTTuwU1A8KV0tQj2CmhPGo_OkLeyuFfigSZvX5MtCx6-d-NerF99hefgJ0LGJvn/s1600/P1000016.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQAyWwsnKArkWP5inZy702BkpV-JIovRommiTfPGz-b-yKZknZ0mWsw-73sOTbdxwtRM09Tdo4eShdjPTTuwU1A8KV0tQj2CmhPGo_OkLeyuFfigSZvX5MtCx6-d-NerF99hefgJ0LGJvn/s320/P1000016.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
Does telling your beloved<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Ain’t no mountain high enough<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Mean the same in LA<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As is does in Telluride?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After all, in Telluride<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You’re over halfway there<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So maybe it stands less than<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Half as high, this love of yours.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Maybe love in Leadville should be<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Held even more in suspicion<o:p></o:p></div>
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Since at best and by definition <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It’s but one-third Mountain-high.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For us in our Cloud Cities<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We don’t have as far to go<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In order to prove the extent<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Of the tiptop of our love.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Besides, there’s probably still<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A chairlift in operation<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Carrying us there<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And no Santa Anas to deal with.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yet lookit all the smack<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We disparagingly throw down upon <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Los Angeles and Hollywood<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
About how their loves are fickle and faint.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Down there in the Land of Make Believe<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Their loves are truer, fought harder for<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There at the very base of their mountains<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And also an Atlantic yet to swim.<o:p></o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment-->eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-61685117599041483732013-04-28T20:40:00.002-06:002013-04-28T20:40:15.531-06:00Normal Miraculousness<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhR8j566JnHtoVTrFXtrL71Ka2U7in3J78Fj9EUQCK4xaR2OFvhbCmVA11yih6t6UQM13xjPsgx6vTnkphs2EWMO-Rv-tQ4yNsJT7HilyO2YobyZSLYmHOxUXr3Gf3vVz4nQyA6G6047Wl2/s1600/P1000152.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhR8j566JnHtoVTrFXtrL71Ka2U7in3J78Fj9EUQCK4xaR2OFvhbCmVA11yih6t6UQM13xjPsgx6vTnkphs2EWMO-Rv-tQ4yNsJT7HilyO2YobyZSLYmHOxUXr3Gf3vVz4nQyA6G6047Wl2/s320/P1000152.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Normal Miraculousness</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">it’s just too surreal</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">to really be real</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">this haunting waning moon</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">on this vernal morning<br /><br />my feet firmly flat<br />on the solid ground<br />i’m looking at it<br />shaking my unbelieving head<br /><br />sometimes it seems it’s<br />not a real-live place<br />this where i live<br />its views too photoshopped<br /><br />but then this is<br />how the wondrous goes<br />how the miraculous presents<br />its normal everyday self</span></span>eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-44204532252494209772013-04-27T19:59:00.002-06:002013-04-27T19:59:27.179-06:00Daily Poems 03 - 08 April 201308 April 2013<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Seasonal Travels</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">cloud curtains veil</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">the mountain ranges before</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">the coming misty rain</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br />sunflowers tracking<br />el sol's arcing passage<br />across cornflower sky<br /><br />congregating<br />river ice stretching bank-to-bank<br />mallard ducks surf hole<br /><br />snow angel silhouettes<br />between footprint squeaks<br />brilliant white hush</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;">07 April 2013</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Waiting<br /><br />We are waiting for a rain<br />maybe some decent snow—<br />any kind of moisture here below<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">that’ll soothe the ongoing strain<br />of this arid valley’s parching pain.<br />Our dreams filled with overflow<br />yield the same thin river we know<br />and longing hopes still wailed in vain.<br /><br />We are yearning for wetness<br />to return into the daily living<br />we tend to overcomplicate.<br />A something to cleanse away the mess<br />and to rehydrate with flush forgiving<br />our crumbling hearts about to desiccate.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">06 April 2013</span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Fenced In<br /><br />If he’d not already spun over in his grave, Pa<br />would have cast his blame-filled eyes at our<br />ineptitude and our ill attempt.<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">Framing fence fractured. Headstone fallen.<br />Piss, pies, and hoof prints mucking<br />the columbines we’d planted o’er him<br />because they were his, “tranquility blooming.”<br /><br />Emptied Jim Beams strewn about not erasing<br />the knowing we’d never meet Pa’s expectations—<br />our best forever short, intentions never enough.<br />Though three years passed away this day,<br />we still put off the necessary, the dutiful,<br />lest we confront still once more again,<br />our old man’s glare.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">05 April 2013</span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">With the Flow<br /><br />As the water launches o'er its cliff,<br />May I fall into the Muses' trance.<br />No hemming nor hawing,<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">No looking before the leap.<br />No questioning my safe arrival<br />to ground-level below.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">04 April 2013</span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Name Calling<br /><br />Assessing the properness<br />of the gifts I've been graced,<br />Against the sturdiness<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">of my sense of unworth.<br />You called me, Poet<br />leaving no room to wiggle,<br />And, O sweet Almighty<br />the crashings of my heart.<br /><br />Seemed as though my home<br />was being poured a new foundation,<br />And with newer bricks and mortar<br />its bearing walls more strongly shored.<br />Called me, Poet<br />as though plain and utter fact,<br />And, oh such exquisite mendings<br />these frayings of my heart.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">03 April 2013</span></span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;">tenderfoot mountain</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;">dusted by off-and-on</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;">springtime slushy snowfall</span> </span>eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-87899663944866228202013-04-27T19:44:00.001-06:002013-04-27T19:44:17.265-06:00Daily Poems: 09 - 12 April 201312 April 2013<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">We Need to Talk Haiku</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">shouldn’t be so hard</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">this daily living together</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">loving together</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br />and yet all it seems<br />is hard rather than easy<br />rather than simple<br /><br />we’re stuck in our ruts<br />sticking to the wrong routes<br />the wrong destinations<br /><br />let’s come together<br />as in our beginning when<br />love was all we grew<br /><br />when nothing at all<br />not even our very selves<br />could come between us<br /><br />aren’t really so hard<br />these walls not protecting us<br />say, let’s tear ‘em down</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">11 April 2013</span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">A Good Day to Fly<br /><br />I think today is the day I will disappear<br />I’ll simply remove my existence<br />And vanish myself from view<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br />I’ve carried for far too long the burden<br />Of being always there for those who<br />Are always choosing not to see<br /><br />Of laying open my heart to others<br />And loving in-vein while watching<br />Ignoring love passing me by<br /><br />So today I will simply slip away<br />Going darkly into the light<br />More fully unto emptiness<br /><br />Like a coital moan sighed in the night<br />Like dreams in the broad daylight<br />Dissipatingly drifting away<br /><br />This whispered sayonara’d goodbye</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">10 April 2013</span></span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Calling In To Work (Again)<br /><br />I know it seems to you<br />I'm always making excuses<br />Forever calling in<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">And right when I'm supposed<br />To already be at my desk<br />But this time it's for real<br />(Not saying any of the others were false)<br />And further it's a verifiable<br />Act of God<br />And seeing as how my work<br />Is itself a Vocation<br />Hence a Calling by God<br />I'm calling in to say,<br />This day, God's calling off<br />My Calling.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">09 April 2013</span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">One morning a man named Ed<br />Awoke a-sucked in his bed<br />He said to himself, It's true<br />There is so much to do<br />Yet under the covers went deeper instead.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span>eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-4764295915650721052013-04-27T19:24:00.001-06:002013-04-27T19:24:25.623-06:00Daily Poems 13 - 16 April 201316 April 2013<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Assailed</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Sometimes the days</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">come all at once</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">and all on the same day.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br />Troubles assail<br />tsunami after tsunami<br />only you in fathomless ocean.<br /><br />Yet sometimes the days<br />bring inundations of<br />joy, graces, blessings, and love.<br /><br />Still the same<br />tsunami after tsunami<br />but such different fathomlessness.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">15 April 2013</span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">tradewinds<br /><br />the wind is blowing<br />upvalley, so the seasons<br />are changing<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br />why do the seasons<br />ever leave this place it’s<br />so beautiful<br /><br />but ‘twould get old<br />same thing month by month<br />years unending<br /><br />no break from either<br />heat nor cold, no wearing any<br />other clothes<br /><br />and no chance for<br />your uplifted face receiving both<br />mist, snowflakes<br /><br />and which for forever<br />would we choose, aspen gold<br />newborne green<br /><br />the morning wind’s blowing<br />upvalley, bringing us something<br />new again</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">14 April 2013</span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Because The Night<br /><br />This night calls for Springsteen<br /><br />Not Darkness on the Edge of<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">Atlantic City Born to Run<br />Nevada Johnny 99 Backstreets<br />Brilliant Disguise Hungry Heart<br />Springsteen<br /><br />But the post-Patti Scialfa<br />Living Proof Red Headed Woman<br />If I Should I Fall Behind<br />My Beautiful Reward Better Days<br />Bruce<br /><br />Let’s never mind any reason to believe<br />And so what if it’s one step up<br />And two steps back because you and me<br />We know what love can do<br />When it’s tougher than the rest<br /><br />This night, this tonight<br />It’s callin’ for Springsteen<br />Come next me without your fears<br />And you can hear it<br />Bruuuuuce! Bruuuuuuce! Bruuuuuuuce!</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">13 April 2013</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Heart(less)<br /><br />I reach out with my heart<br />in order to hold yours<br />extend it toward you, yours—<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">look, we’re hanging here.<br /><br />Don’t go leaving me heartless<br />half-empty, not half-full<br />fully isolated and abandoned<br />a heart less, a missing beat.</span></span>eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-11434900105134033392013-04-27T19:14:00.002-06:002013-04-27T19:14:06.752-06:00Goodbye to Winter<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">I’m not ready yet to say goodbye to winter</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">These recent spring days have been too warm</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Haven’t allowed my body to drift deep enough</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">Into restorative, rest-filled sleep.<br /><br />I’m not ready yet to say goodbye to winter<br />My thermostat is still set for subfreezing<br />Missing temperatures falling below zero<br />Mornings calm and still and new-white.<br /><br />I’m not ready yet to say goodbye to winter<br />For there hasn’t been a slow trickling away<br />An easing into the season-soon-to-come<br />Rather, the door has been slammed.<br /><br />I’m not ready yet to say goodbye to winter<br />For I waited for too many tomorrows<br />To make my snow-angels and the igloos<br />And simply relish it while it was here.</span></span>eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-51433503893005436972013-04-26T16:33:00.000-06:002013-04-26T16:33:08.932-06:00Daily Poems: 17- 20 April 201320 Apr 13<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">come spring, soon</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">this winter of your</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">disconnect has</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">persisted far too long</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">the soil under your feet<br />is ready enough<br /><br />so may my wishes<br />and my blessings<br />like river vapor rising<br />upward and higher<br />waft their way to thee<br /><br />until the rains of spring<br />sprout seeds of hope<br />you'd forgotten you'd planted<br />bearing finally the succulent<br />fruits of your labors</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br /></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;">19 Apr 2013</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">in the beginning were the words<br /><br />i only exist because of<br />the words i leave behind<br />on the pages<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">the computer screen<br />brick walls<br />bathroom walls<br /><br />it’s not a reciprocal<br />existence between us<br />words came first<br />and i from them<br />they were here before<br />and shall long remain after<br /><br />hanging about me<br />they’re in the ether<br />i am but only<br />messenger and<br />relayer and<br />revealer<br /><br />as long as they<br />remain visual<br />readable<br />i still am<br />but as they fade<br />so likewise will i</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">18 Apr 2013</span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">a-parting<br /><br />remember<br />that week it snowed unendingly<br />when you thought you would<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">never be warm ever—<br />yet the clouds parted<br /><br />remember<br />the juneday it rained so profusely<br />and thoroughly we waited for<br />frogs to begin falling—<br />but the clouds parted<br /><br />remember<br />too, your long dark night<br />pitched deeper than night<br />no wholly moon to guide—<br />then the clouds parted<br /><br />and now<br />it’s yet another goodbye<br />still one more time again<br />the world claustrophobic—<br />until the clouds’ parting</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">17 Apr 2013</span></span></span><br />
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this van is bound for glory<br /><br />don't need no dead-ass dinosaurs<br />don't need no discarded fryer oil<br />don't even need no extension cord<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">this here van runs on flower power<br /><br />don't need no pistons jumpin'<br />don't need no diesel slurrin'<br />don't even need no wankel "mmmm"in'<br />for on this here van love is the engine<br /><br />don't need no highway mappage<br />don't even need downloaded directions<br />'cause this here van is bound for glory<br />and there ain't but the One Road there</span></div>
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eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-42752753702031848802013-04-26T16:15:00.005-06:002013-04-26T16:17:17.630-06:00Stationary Identification<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Today I will</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Simply sit still</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">While taking in</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">The awe-full wonderment</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Of it all.</span>eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-81563622606031240132013-04-25T11:59:00.001-06:002013-04-25T11:59:23.831-06:00Daily Poems: 20 - 23 April 201323 April 2013<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Git ‘Er Done</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Don’t want to come to</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">The pages today</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Need some time off</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">Need to refuel<br />Need to recharge the batteries<br /><br />But skipping work ain’t an option<br />No matter your excuse, your mood<br />Y’gotta punch in<br />Y’gotta put in the hours<br />Y’gotta be present to win<br /><br />So what if you’re behind on sleep<br />If the player’s cued to Friday Night Lights<br />The call is the purpose to your life<br />The call has to be answered<br />The call can’t be sent to voicemail<br /><br />Put your tokus in the chair<br />Pen the words as they come<br />This day is the day to continue on<br />This day requires persistence because it’s hard<br />This day—do you stay or do you go</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;">22 April 2013</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Lookit You<br /><br />Shakily, uncertainly, virgin brow<br />scrunched on the inside I stand<br />before me the open expanse of<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">living room, Mommy ahead<br />initial step, my legs buckle<br />up again, down again<br />once more, once more too<br />frustrated tears flooding my face<br />as in her arms I rise,<br />Lookit you—walking already!<br /><br />Less than half a week until<br />second grade begins and only<br />last week with my water wings<br />finally off have I been allowed<br />outside the kiddies’ wading pool<br />water to my chest I surge forward<br />Becky Hatcher just past my fingertips<br />kicking an thrashing I inch closer<br />but she persists in her backing away<br />when I go down for the last time<br />coughing and everything spent<br />she takes me up, letting me hang<br />on the concrete lip, catching my breath<br />Lookit you—from three feet to five;<br />you’re almost over my head!<br /><br />Back from spring break, there she is again<br />Cheryl Lynnette Howard<br />walking to class with our star quarterback<br />still she gives me her smile her wink<br />the wave of her week-in-Aruba hand<br />in the dinner serving line, with her<br />hair cascading down, wearing her<br />sleeveless white dress it makes me<br />fumble my courage, still when she stops<br />in front of me, after the passing the dish<br />of cottage cheese, I also give her<br />the brown envelope which covers her tray<br />inside, my pencil portrait of her and<br />a letter asking her to a movie<br />it’s the letter she and quarterback see first<br />he laughs glances at me and laughs moreso<br />next morning we pass again, this time<br />she comes to me, lifting my chin with her hand<br />Lookit you—a freshman and a townie<br />yet all but taking my heart!<br /><br />The results come back, Katie is fertile whereas<br />I’m as sterile as the lab that tested us<br />early on she made it clear she wanted a boy<br />to spoil rotten and a daughter for me to guard<br />she had the names, Aaron Donovan and Bethany Michelle<br />but now all she’ll be able to have, because of me<br />is just the names and the empty ache<br />so I help her fill the adoption papers out<br />in time, in time piled upon time, a child arrives<br />her first night, nothing Katie tries settles<br />little Heather Rue down, ceases her crying<br />until I take her in my own arms, where<br />she coughs then coos<br />Lookit you—such a daughter’s daddy!<br /><br />Lookit you—are you seeing?</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">21 April 2013</span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Trading Up<br /><br />For years, for forever it seems<br />I’ve sat in the cheap seats<br />Watching you from afar<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">Believing that distance separated us.<br /><br />I collected your collections<br />Rejoiced when seeing new works<br />In The New Yorker, O, Crazy Horse<br />Yearning someday, please, to be there too.<br /><br />Years worked their sorcery and magick<br />I too became both bound and monthly’d<br />Yet I continued with my persistence<br />Of keeping you at the very same distance.<br /><br />I stood you upon a pedestal high above me<br />The gold lettering on the enplaqued terrazzo<br />Listing the awards and the citations which<br />More than the velvet ropes separated us.<br /><br />Now this morning, face-to-face, hug-in-hug<br />I’m seeing no pedestal, flat-footed you stand<br />And jiminy you’re even a bit shorter than me<br />From my false idol’s shell is emerging my friend.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">20 April 2013</span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">That's Amore<br /><br />"when the moon hits your eye<br />like a big piece of pie,<br />that's amore!"<br /><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br />sometimes i misheard<br />what i heard, but then<br />a pizza and a pie are not<br />anywhere near<br />the same thing<br /><br />and weren't all three of<br />those stooges hitting<br />each other with pies<br />and right in the eyes?<br />those wiseguys!<br /><br />but now i'm older<br />sometimes wiser<br />been around a few blocks<br />so i know what it's like<br />being moonstruck, moon-eyed<br /><br />i've howled at the moon<br />prayed to the moon<br />danced under the moon<br />namaste'd the moon<br />waxed and waned alongside it<br /><br />and when you're green<br />your attempts at love<br />can indeed be cheesy<br />or come back atcha<br />like a pie in the face<br /><br />but whether thin and crispy<br />or thick and chewy<br />one hopes to never grow<br />too crusty for love<br />no matter how you slice it.</span></span>eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-2080887284984490182013-04-25T11:45:00.001-06:002013-04-25T11:45:09.771-06:00Spring Preparations<br />
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It’s been spring for a month<o:p></o:p></div>
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Yet it’s today I finally pull the<o:p></o:p></div>
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Dry stems from the otherwise<o:p></o:p></div>
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Empty pots, turn the soil, and<o:p></o:p></div>
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Order more seeds.<o:p></o:p></div>
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I’ve been watering the soil<o:p></o:p></div>
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Adding coffee grounds and<o:p></o:p></div>
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Compost to prepare it for the<o:p></o:p></div>
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Plantings of newly-bought<o:p></o:p></div>
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Sunnies both annual and<o:p></o:p></div>
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Perennial to grace my balcony.<o:p></o:p></div>
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This morning in three of the pots<o:p></o:p></div>
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I planted the remnants of seeds<o:p></o:p></div>
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Left from a previous order and<o:p></o:p></div>
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Cullings from the autumns before<o:p></o:p></div>
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Hoping they’ll sprout and flower.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Also this morning I came to the desk<o:p></o:p></div>
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With an seed that’s years old and<o:p></o:p></div>
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I hope, still alive, waiting to be planted<o:p></o:p></div>
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Into watered, composted, and turned soil<o:p></o:p></div>
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I’ve been preparing for many such springs.<o:p></o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment-->eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-56841585099004814172013-04-25T11:44:00.000-06:002013-04-25T11:44:00.478-06:00And Now for Something a Little DifferentThis is will be a bit of a divergence from my usual postings to this blogsite, but in honor of National Poetry Month, and also to give a fellow <a href="http://wordweeds.com/">poet</a> who isn't on Facebook a chance to see what I've been doing, I'll be posting here (at least) some of the poems I've been daily posting on a FB group.<br />
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Who knows? Maybe this'll turn into something akin to what Rachel Kellum, <a href="http://ahundredfallingveils.com/">Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer</a>, are currently doing.eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-79590114247361939122013-01-02T19:20:00.000-07:002013-01-02T19:59:47.373-07:00Farther? Along<br />
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<i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">I've been lately thinking/about my life time/all the things I've done/and how it's been....</span></i></div>
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<i><a href="http://johndenver.com/albums/poems-prayers-and-promises/"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">-John Denver, "Poems, Prayers and Promises"</span></a></i></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><i><br /></i><i>Standing/On the rim/of the world/Holding back/Lest I fall in./Seems like/I've been here/A hundred years/Telling myself/Tomorrow I'll begin.</i></span></div>
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<i><a href="http://msdedi.typepad.com/reflex_photos/2007/07/sunset-little-c.html"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">-James Kavanaugh, "Standing"</span></a></i></div>
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I'm a contemplative critter anyway; so with it being a new year, I'm pondering who I am and where I come from; where I see myself going, and whether it's where I'm supposed to be heading. Specifically, I'm thinking about my writing. Eleven years ago and change, I stood atop Tenderfoot Mountain, looking out over the town, and I vowed that should the Powers That Be allow me to move here, I'd more fully commit myself to my writing. After nearly a decade of living here, how much farther along am I?</div>
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This past year, I submitted thirteen times—a baker's dozen, read sixty-three short stories, four novels, and three non-fiction titles. I haven't bothered to do the arithmetic, but I'm confident I spent less than a hundred hours writing last year.</div>
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Yet there's a part of the story that these numbers can never tell. The latest issue of <i><a href="http://cozine.com/">Colorado Central Magazine</a></i> arrived in mailboxes, four days ago. I've already received two compliments on my essay there. Last February, I was invited to join other local writers and poets in helping the <a href="http://thebookhavenonline.com/">local independent bookstore</a> celebrate their move across the street to larger, snazzier digs. I've even had writers ask me to do reviews of their forthcoming books. So, never mind what the numbers and my self-deprecation say, folks who know about such things regard me as a talented, seek-outable writer.<br />
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In her recent <a href="http://sampatron.wordpress.com/2012/11/26/oh-grow-up/">blogpost</a>, Sam Heggan comes clean about still not knowing what she wants to be when she grows up. This is what I'm talking about when I talk about "where I'm supposed to be heading." I've touched on at least a couple aspects of this in previous blogposts. To be engaged in the <a href="http://penningthepage.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-big-conversation.html">Big Conversation</a> and t<a href="http://penningthepage.blogspot.com/2012/02/whispered-by-name.html">o be taken seriously as a writer</a> (especially by myself). Another desire is to be an asset to the writing community, as a source of inspiration and assistance. In a <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aycvCq-r7uw">video</a> for <a href="http://www.telluridelibrary.org/component/videoflow/?task=cats&cat=16&sl=categories&layout=listview">Talking Gourds</a>,<a href="http://wordweeds.com/"> Rachel Kellum</a>, tells how she's been taken in by poets such as Art Goodtimes and Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer. Likewise, another <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YqbY5rqCRhE">video</a> has Rosemerry introducing <a href="http://www.coloradohumanities.org/content/colorado-poet-laureate-david-mason">David Mason</a>, saying what a wellspring of wisdom he'd been for her, and in his introduction, Mason thanks Rosemerry for her assistance.<br />
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It's striking me, now, how I've been talking about the results of writing, rather than the act itself. Perhaps something to think, er..., to <b>write</b> about.</div>
eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-32488346519161085952012-10-17T11:52:00.000-06:002012-10-17T11:52:12.848-06:00Surely Another Writer<br />
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Late last week, I came across a
mini-anthology of poetry which contains my only published poem. It’s the result
of a nine-years-ago contest conducted by <a href="http://www.coloradopoetscenter.org/eWords/issue7/shavano.html">our local poetry group</a>. Since it’d
been some time since I’d last looked through the collection, I did so again,
curious to see what names, now familiar these years later, popped out at me.
The name of one local poet did catch my eye—someone whom I’ve wound up getting
to know and spend time with. When I told her about finding the chapbook, and
seeing her three poems in it, she commented that she had a vague recollection
of those poems, and wondered how I relate, now, to my own poem from the
collection. Well, I’d cringed when I reread it—I’d do it so differently, now. And,
as she said about herself, “It was surely another [person] who wrote that.”<o:p></o:p></div>
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I guess it’s a good sign that
something I wrote a little more than nine years ago makes me cringe. I must be
getting somewhere, after all. And maybe I am maturing in my craft. Maybe I’m
maturing as a person, as well. </div>
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But let’s not allow my cringing to be the final
word on the matter. For one thing, knowledgeable people decided the poem was
something other than cringy, for they published it. (And in fact, when <a href="http://themountainmail.com/">our local paper</a> ran its article about the collection, mine was one of the three or
four poems mentioned by name.) I wrote the poem to the best of my abilities,
then—just as I currently do, and will continue doing. Hopefully, I’ll be always
improving, always seeing an increase across the years in the caliber of my
writing. In a sense, I’ll forever be the same writer: writing to the best of my
continually increasing ability.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Yet, I’ll also forever be another
writer: changing, improving, building and developing upon what “surely another
person” has done. Whatever greatness I might realize as a writer will be due to
my standing on the shoulders of those other persons.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<!--EndFragment-->eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-26861350587687560142012-10-10T10:47:00.000-06:002012-10-10T10:47:36.510-06:00The Big Conversation<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Sometimes the old standard-issue
reasons for doing something, especially why you do your art, become, indeed,
standard-issue and old. The more they’re recited, the more they ring as outworn
and untrue. Hopefully, a new perspective on the why, a revision as it were,
comes along and you see again with clarity why you continue the hard and often
isolating work.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Recent discussions with a Western
Slope poet and educator have brought me this sort of beginner’s eye regarding
the reason why I persist with my writing. It’s not a new idea whatsoever, and
it’s always been there, even if unrecognized and unnamed: I write to engage, be
involved in, and expand the Big Conversation.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
There are matters and issues about
life which are central and important: love, relationships, community,
integrity, compassion, empathy, openness, focusing, becoming/being whom we’re
meant to be. Each of these categories is expansive and has a plethora of
entry-points and multiple layers. The connections and overlaps among them are,
likewise, numerous. Discussions about them are much of what comprises the Big
Conversation—the nitty-gritty stuff at the foundational core of our lives.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
In defining, vocation, Frederick
Buechner said it’s, “the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep
hunger meet.” For me, the Big Conversation fulfills both. It’s what I most wish
to be engaged in and what the world appears most desperate for.</div>
<!--EndFragment-->eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-13332900096203370122012-10-04T10:30:00.000-06:002012-10-04T10:30:32.843-06:00Putting Yourself “Out There”
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Maybe because I was born last, I
learned to stay out of people’s way, to not be a problem to others, to be
quiet, blend into the scenery, and not call attention to myself. And so here I
am, X number of years later, a writer, which requires a special kind of putting yourself out there, of presenting
yourself to people. Even people who never knew of your existence until you
popped up in front of them. It’s not enough to heckle the people you know; you have
to also do it to complete strangers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
We artists can tend to not be
social critters—which comes in quite handy when the crafting of our artistry needs to get
done. Mostly by default, we’re polite and humbly meek. We typically try not
calling attention to ourselves. It’s best when we’re off others’ radars. But
art requires an audience, which means we artists can’t keep our
output tucked away somewhere; we have to publicly display it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Awhile back, Rosemerry Wahtola
Trommer, a poet of my recent on-line acquaintance, sent me a copy of her <a href="http://liquidlightpress.com/rwt.htm">just-published work</a>, to review. In the thank you card she included, she wrote,
“It’s so hard for me to put myself out there this way,” but that my openness
and excitement toward her work, “went a long way toward making it seem ‘okay.’”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
I recently asked her about this,
because Rosemerry is very definitely, “out there,” what with readings, workshops,
co-hosting a<a href="http://www.telluridelibrary.org/component/videoflow/?task=play&id=16"> monthly video-taped program</a> with Telluride’s <a href="http://www.telluridelibrary.org/">Wilkinson Public Library</a>, various group poetry performances, and also <a href="http://wordwoman.com/books/books.htm">published work</a>. (She has
yet another collection, coming very soon.) Her reply mentioned the paradox of
the scariness of sending deeply personal and intimate work into the world; yet
there being little real risk, because the ego isn’t so involved. She concluded
with, “<span style="color: #1a1a1a;">I guess my point is that it is a stretch to
‘join the big conversation’ as I like to say, but at the same time it begins to
feel dangerous not to. We are all in it together, and if it rises up to join
in, then join in!”</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment-->eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-24317143186820764652012-09-27T13:08:00.001-06:002012-09-27T13:08:55.072-06:00How It’s Done
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
A little over two decades ago, when
my becoming a writer was still a newly-borne dream, I read <a href="http://pamhouston.wordpress.com/">Pam Houston</a>’s, “How to Talk to a Hunter.” I had two reactions: “Oh crap, I’m so far from being able
to write something like this,” and, “Cool, this is what’s possible.” Currently,
I’m reading <a href="http://www.patriciahampl.com/">Patricia Hampl</a>’s, <i><a href="http://www.patriciahampl.com/tellyou.html">I Could Tell You Stories</a></i><span style="font-style: normal;">, and I’m having the same sensations of recognizing
how far I still have to go, while seeing the world of possibilities opening
further.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
I still don’t write stories anywhere
near the caliber of Houston’s, “Hunter.” Then, that particular story stands out
when compared to the rest of her work. Yet, I could surely select any of her
short stories and still see a distance between hers and mine. It’d be easy to
get discouraged, to lay the pen down, and go back to being a French Fry Master
at BurgerLand. Fortunately, that second realization also arrives. Just because
I’m unable to do as well, now, absolutely does not mean I never will. <a href="http://www.faculty.uci.edu/profile.cfm?faculty_id=5395">Ron Carlson</a> repeatedly states that, “the writer is the one who stays in the room.”
He means they stay in the writing chair, staying with the story, rather than
getting up for another cup of coffee, to look out the window to check on the
weather, to go to the stacks to make sure some fact they’ve just written is
accurate. Surely, he also means they stay with writing, “in the room,” across
the years, returning day after week after month to confront the empty pages.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Due to my having read her
award-winning short story, I’ve continued following Houston’s career. I’ve read
interviews where she mentions much the same frustrations and discouragements
I’ve had. Reading this, especially more than once and across several years,
levels the playing field. She, too, is mortal, struggles with and for her
craft. It also places the reins back into mine own hands. If one mortal can
achieve such writing, then so can this mortal; therefore, shuddup with your
whining, and write.</div>
<!--EndFragment-->eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-13017580008747675842012-09-17T09:31:00.000-06:002012-09-17T09:31:06.994-06:00You Never Know <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
The life of a writer, an artist,
can be isolating. While you’re likely not working in a windowless garret; you are,
nonetheless, working in solitude. Eventually, you send your work out into the
world; and then it’s back to the grindstone, isolated and alone again.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
What you’ve sent out into the world
is out there, on its own, “under consideration.” You wish it well, hope it’s
well-received, but your focus and priorities are now on the next project. What
is done is done. Hopefully, what you’ve sent out is accepted, thus finding its
place in the world. And it’s from there the life your project leads will take
it places you’ll never know of—unless word comes back to you.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
One of the things I consistently do
is write a short piece for my church’s monthly newsletter. Years ago, I gave a
printout of one of these to a friend who worked in the same real estate office
as the woman I’d written about. A few months later, I learned that this woman
had hit a low spot, questioning whether what she did really mattered. My friend
showed her what I’d written, telling her, “It’s about you.” My friend me that
that little piece of my writing effected a one-eighty in her co-worker’s
outlook on herself and her life. Had I not been told this, I likely would have
totally forgotten that little bit of writing, having let it fall from memory
like the previous newsletter bits before, and most of them since.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
John Lennon wrote, “Life is what
happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” Sometimes, while we’re focused
elsewhere, a project we’ve worked on, finished, and sent out into the world is
still out there, working; still not finished. And we may never know.</div>
<!--EndFragment-->eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-50572942655127490252012-09-06T09:55:00.000-06:002012-09-06T09:55:24.987-06:00Playing Well With Peoria<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
I don’t think there’s a writer who
hasn’t been asked, “Where do you get your ideas?” It can a troubling
question—seems it’d be easy to answer, yet it can be frustratingly not so.
Stephen King has a ready reply at his disposal: “I buy them from two spinster
sisters who live in Peoria.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
In asking where one gets their
ideas, it can be inferred the questioner is expecting a singular answer; and
perhaps there are writers for whom such is the case. But most of us, I think,
struggle with finding inspiration: It can seem such a shy, pensive, volatile
and elusive critter, we don’t know, ourself, from whence it comes. Telling
somebody that we buy them, somewhere, gives a sought-for elegant answer, while
making us seem witty. Additionally, this answer’s humor can serve to point out
the ridiculous nature of the question. (“Well now, inquisitive one, tell me,
where do any ideas <i>you</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> have come from,
hmm?”)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
It’s a writing cliché that, “ideas
are everywhere, all around us,” and the word we typically use for the getting
of our ideas, “inspiration,” has its origins in Latin, indicating an in-take of
breath. So is it much of a stretch to say we breath in our ideas, our
inspirations, that they’re a literal part of us? (This also takes care of the
notion that, “inspiration must come from within.”)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
If only it were that simple. How
many of us have come to the writing and found nothing? We’re constantly
breathing in, ergo, supposedly constantly receiving inspiration; however… (And
don’t tell us to, “be open,” because we are; we’ll take anything, right now.) Sometimes,
this dryness or emptiness comes after a particularly fecund period of writing,
and we wonder what’s suddenly happened. At other times, it’s part of a long dry
spell, and we wonder when it’s going to end. Perhaps it’s because there seems
to be no explanation for the fecund and the fallow periods, and because ideas
seem to come to us, rather than from us, that the notion of muses is still with
us. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Maybe King is also being hopeful in
saying he gets his ideas from those two sisters. When all else fails, see
what’s playing in Peoria.</div>
<!--EndFragment-->eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-90159801703451853172012-08-14T10:00:00.000-06:002012-08-14T23:02:02.133-06:00The Age Thing<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
In a recent <a href="http://penningthepage.blogspot.com/2012/07/mutually-green-eyed-early-this-year-i.html">blogpost</a>, I listed
reasons I envied a particular Western Slope poet, <a href="http://wordwoman.com/">Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer</a>.
One of my reasons was her being six years my junior, yet already so much
further ahead of me. Perhaps because I’m the baby of my family, age has always
been a factor, a gauge, for longer than I can remember. Too, I grew up in
Texas, sorta the South, where regard and respect for one’s elders is axiomatic.
And even now, as I’m but a year and small change from AARP age, I’m still
feeling behind, like the baby of the writing family—even amid those younger
than I.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Those of my tribe who are older
than I, nonetheless, at ages much younger than my current one, had accomplished
so much already. When <a href="http://coyoteclan.com/">Terry Tempest Williams</a> came to a <a href="http://news.bookweb.org/news/chinook-closes-book-bittersweet-ending">bookstore</a> in Colorado
Springs for a reading and signing of, <i><a href="http://coyoteclan.com/books/red.html">Red</a></i><span style="font-style: normal;">,
she was already such a name that the bookstore had to hand out seating tickets,
which were filled weeks ahead of her arrival. During the event, Williams had
just the month before turned nearly three years younger than I am, now.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Here I am, on the cusp of half a
century, with so phenomenally little to show for my writing: A dozen, maybe a
dozen and a half, book reviews; handful of essays, several rejected short
stories. Every writer I see is, or was, at least ten full years ahead of me.
The latest bloomer I can find is, <a href="http://authors.simonandschuster.com/Annie-Proulx/8544">Annie Proulx</a>, who wasn’t published until she
was forty. (I was forty-three when my <a href="http://cozine.com/2007-november/instant-karma-by-wayne-k-sheldrake/"><span id="goog_1713725608"></span>first book review<span id="goog_1713725609"></span></a> was published.)
Typically, by their early- or mid-thirties, a writer’s career is already being
established, if not already firmly so. Reading John McPhee say he submitted to <i>The
New Yorker</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> for ten years until they
accepted his work exacerbates my feelings of inadequacy and having come far too
late to the party.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Yet, listen to me, being upset and
despairing because I’m not following convention. Acting as though I have to
give up my vocation because I’ve become later along in my years in answering
it. As though because I’ve had a late start, I’m destined, doomed, to never
finish. Too, I forgetting one of the crucial traits writers and artists must
possess: persistence.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Writing, like much any art, can be
isolating and lonely. It can be despairing during the tough spells. It can seem
an easier and better thing to chuck it all for something more sensible, more
conventional. For those of us without a family or readily-available support
group to spur us onward through the fog and muck, to remind us of our abilities
and how the world is needfully hungry for our gifts, it can seem even more
uphill, even more isolating and lonely.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Early in my association with <a href="http://susanjtweit.com/">Susan J Tweit</a>, I was commenting how it seemed I hadn’t gotten much of anywhere, even
after all my years of writing. “I think you’re further along than you think,”
she replied. At around the same time, during a writing conference, WC Jameson
pulled me aside and told me much the same thing. Perhaps this is where talent,
ability isn’t enough. I’ve read Georgia O’Keeffe regarded herself as possessing
mere average talent, but above average arrogance. Afterall, writing is the easy
part. It’s the placing your work into the outside world that takes courage.
Perhaps it’s something other than talent for writing that’s placed so many of
the rest of my tribe so far ahead of me.<o:p></o:p></div>
eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-58204601459168723222012-07-31T09:46:00.000-06:002012-07-31T09:49:19.646-06:00Answering<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<i>You don’t use your imagination.
It uses you.</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> –Wendy Videlock.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<i>I don’t believe that people
choose to be writers: the words choose the people; and they choose pretty
carefully.</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> –David Lee.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Hopefully, one doesn’t have to have
been writing long before they encounter the sense that something separate from
themselves is driving things. Some folks talk about receiving inspiration,
being taken by an idea that won’t let go until it’s made manifest, of being
called to their writing. If they’re called, then who’s the caller?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Allow me a moment to acknowledge
that not every writer
feels the presence of some outside entity joining them in the studio; and
there’s much to be said against laying too much responsibility and
accountability in the hands of anyone other than ourselves. But I’ve noticed
that even the seemingly most atheistic and philosophically materialistic of
writers will, at least off the record, admit to times when it feels more like
they’re dictating or transcribing, rather than writing. There does, indeed,
seem to be a willing (willful) partner in the game.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
There’s a creative-centric bon mot,
“When the muse calls, don’t send it to voice-mail.” Thus, I must pick one
particular nit with what Lee says: The world is riddled with those who have chosen
to ignore, turn away from, where they’re called to go; we do exercise some
choice in the matter.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Likewise, as I said earlier, we
still have responsibility to and accountability for the work we’re called to
do. As Twyla Tharp noted in, <i>The Creative Habit</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, “…but whether or not God has kissed your brow, you still have to
work.” Being called requires an answering, and a taking of action.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
When someone displays a particular
talent that distinguishes them, we’ll say they have been gifted with
writing/drawing/singing/whatever; or we’ll say they have a gift for whatever,
or are a gifted ________. This gift stuff isn’t isolated, isn’t unidirectional.
Our talent is a gift we receive, and one we’re obligated to share.<o:p></o:p></div>eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-7268090185847965022012-07-25T10:25:00.000-06:002012-07-25T10:25:43.413-06:00Time Enough for a Proper Mess<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">Recently, I
attended a Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer poetry reading, put on by <a href="http://www.westerncoloradowriters.org/">Western Colorado Writers' Forum</a>, in Grand Junction. It was a small group of us who attended.
(Well, The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band was also in town that night...) I brought with
me, <i><a href="http://sevenoakspublishingco.com/SO/Our_Publications.html#1">An Elevated View: Colorado Writers on Writing</a></i>, in hopes Trommer would sign
the opening page of her essay, "From Pretty Pink Bows to Chicken Manure:
Embracing Poetry as Practice."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">After her
reading, I took the book with me when I walked up to greet and thank her. When
she laid it on a table in order to sign it, she began laughing, telling me that
in the four years since she'd written and submitted it, she's developed so much
as a writer. "I read this [essay], and I feel sorry for the woman who wrote
it. My writing is so different now."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">Two years ago,
The Paris Review <a href="http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/5997/the-art-of-nonfiction-no-3-john-mcphee">interviewed</a> John McPhee. One of the many things discussed in
the interview is the necessity for writers to allow time enough to develop
their craft. McPhee says he submitted to The New Yorker for at least a full
decade until they finally accepted something. "And they were <b>not</b> making a
mistake."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">But this isn't
what Trommer was mainly talking about. She feels her writing was too
constructed, not "messy" enough. "Writing is not meant to be contained, it's
meant to be wild and messy." That she would say this about this essay tickles
me, for it's one the essay's main topics: the need for her work to be less
orderly. And while it is true that writing can be polished and well-crafted to
such an extent that there's no life left, (what Salman Rushdie has called, "a
widespread, humorless, bloodless competence"), the reason we repeatedly revise
our drafts is because they're not submittable, publishable work, yet.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">So, once again, the murky middleground: Good writing is to be contained
and structured enough that it flows, but not so much so that it ceases flowing
with life. Writing isn't, "For Display Purposes Only," but is to be sent out
into the world, living and breathing, to find its way, to find where it
belongs.</span><!--EndFragment-->eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-60682394352268032702012-07-16T13:00:00.001-06:002012-08-14T23:00:13.944-06:00Mutually Green-eyed<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Early this year, I became Facebook
friends with <a href="http://wordwoman.com/">Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer</a>, a poet from Colorado’s Western Slope.
Recently, she posted on her wall a link to, fellow writer, <a href="http://christieaschwanden.com/">Christie Aschwanden’s</a>
blogpost about envy. The impetus of the <a href="http://www.lastwordonnothing.com/2012/06/19/envypoem/"><span id="goog_641322573"></span>blogpost<span id="goog_641322574"></span></a>, oddly, was Rosemerry’s
expressing to Christie her jealousy of her. That Rosemerry would have any
reason to be jealous of another person seems so bass-ackward wrong. It ought to
be the other way around. How does yours truly envy Rosemerry? The number of
reasons is incredible, but here are four:<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
1) She has a much fuller “outside
life” than I, yet still manages to write (and publish, <a href="http://ahundredfallingveils.wordpress.com/">on-line</a>) every day. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
2) She has a prestige that allows
her to make a living from her writing. (Okay, the prestige is more than
well-earned, but still…)<o:p></o:p></div>
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3) The woman is everywhere:
conferences, workshops, readings, open mics, photo shoots, bookstore events and
others. (See #2, above.) Still, I’ve never seen her look anything other than
vibrant, hale, and hearty.<o:p></o:p></div>
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4) Finally, and most harshly, the
woman is six years younger than I, yet so far ahead of me. Much more than six
years, it seems.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
In my FB dealings with Rosemerry,
I’m sure I’ve teasingly called her a goddess, at least once. But the truth is she’s merely,
thoroughly, human, with all that that implies and contains. Again, the seed
crystal event that led to Christie’s blogpost was Rosemerry finally meeting
her, and saying how she’d envied her. So much so, in fact, Rosemerry’d written
a poem about her jealousy, which she recited to Christie, on the spot, when
they finally met. And, in the ironic way life often works, Christie quickly
fired back with her own poem, expressing her own envy of Rosemerry. She’d been
made uncomfortable by Rosemerry’s poem; and Rosemerry was subsequently
uncomfortable because of Christie’s.</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
The irony deepens, saddens further
actually, because they each were jealous of the other’s writing. Full-bore,
award-winning, nationally-recognized writers, each of them; and still, this
envy. And it was mutual.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Perhaps the reason envy is included
in the Seven Deadly Sins is because it leads one to discount, to dismiss, one's own gifts. To discount and dismiss themselves. And because it incorrectly
depicts the connection between gift and recipient. (It’s a shaky, troublesome
thing, separating, distinguishing the two.) The bumper sticker says, We’re all
alone in this together. That’s what envy manifests.<o:p></o:p></div>
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I gave reasons why I envy
Rosemerry, which I too often do, and she’s not at all the only one, nor the
only writer, I gaze at through the wrong end of the telescope with my “green”
eyes. However, I have talents and abilities which even Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer, in all
her magnificence, doesn’t have. Focusing on what I lack keeps me from
furthering my own abundance. </div>
<br />
<i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">O me! O life! of the questions of these recurring,</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;"><br /></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">...Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I,</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">and who more faithless?)</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Of eyes that vainly crave the light, of the objects mean, of the</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">struggle ever renew'd,</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">...The question, O me! so sad, recurring--What good amid these, O me, O life?</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Answer.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">That you are here--that life exists and identity,</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span></i><br />
<div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;">-Walt Whitman</span></span><br />
<div>
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eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2181133247542413438.post-84904798202518212902012-05-02T19:44:00.000-06:002012-05-02T19:44:11.778-06:00<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
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Necessary?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
In the past few weeks, I’ve
received both my state and federal tax refunds, as well as an end-of-year
“profit sharing” check from the <a href="http://www.hrrmc.com/">hospital</a> where I work. With this influx of
funds I acquired new and brighter lighting for my workspace, <a href="http://www.alerafurniture.com/p-720571-aleraaleet42me10betrosseriesmeshmid-backswiveltiltchairblack.aspx">an office chair</a> to
replace a sixteen-year-old folding chair, a bookshelf, <a href="http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject/Reference/EnglishDictionaries/?view=usa&ci=9780199233243">Shorter Oxford English Dictionary</a>, and <a href="http://www.levenger.com/PAGETEMPLATES/PRODUCT/Product.asp?Params=Category=8-275|Level=2-3|pageid=8057">two</a> <a href="http://www.levenger.com/PAGETEMPLATES/PRODUCT/Product.asp?Params=Category=8-831|Level=2-3|pageid=6810">fountain pens</a>. Other than the compact fluorescent bulbs and
the bookshelf, which made immediate obvious improvements, I continued waffling
a bit regarding whether these purchases had been necessary.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
It’s part of the suffering artist
shtick to force ourselves to be spare and minimal. As a writer, what more do I
really need than something to write on, and something to write with? I have a
computer and printer, isn’t that lush enough? And as for fountain pens, I
already had four in steady rotational use—and two more that weren’t being used.
The metal folding chair was still capably supporting my butt, with nary a
wobble or a creak.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
Now that there’s been some time to let
the dust settle, I’m not feeling so harsh toward myself. In previous posts I’ve
mentioned how my writing seems to be opening up, this calendar year. The recent
acquisitions seem both natural outgrowth of this expansion of my writing, as
well as “carroting” the writing that’s to follow. They’re acknowledging the
writing so far, and also coaxing me further still along.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
It’s a cliché that writing is about
keeping your ass in the chair. Now, I have a chair that makes doing that more
tantalizing. I’m eager to be playing with the new fountain pens, and there’s so
many good things regarding playing while creationing. And how can it be wrong
for a writer to finally get their first “for grown-ups” dictionary? Again, an
answering where you are at the moment, while calling you toward the territory
ahead.<o:p></o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment-->eduardohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04132790595670978827noreply@blogger.com2