Thursday morning poetry corner

[swag]

Happy Thursday, poetry lovers. I'll kick things off with one from A.R. Ammons.



SPINEJACKING

One of these days I'm gonna leave you, baby:
I know it: I can tell:
my bellyfat shakes and knows:
one of the days I'm gonna just
up and outsy: like that:
my dog knows: he
turns around a lot lately:
I don't know if the parrot knows:
it isn't just lately she started scratching:
you always were a kind of busy bitch:
one of these days I'm gonna just pack off:
you get to make some new
arrangements, then: you like to change
things around, change this one:
one of these days I'm gonna leave you, baby:
I know it: I can tell:
my bellyfat shakes and knows.

[velvet]

1. Happy Thursday to you too, swag

Neat poem. I love that "my bellyfat shakes and knows" line, and "you like to change things around, change this one ..."

Here is one of mine own, written last month in a cheerful mood.

The sun is my planet,
I shall not freak.
Yeah, though I brake in the littered gutters of bus-stops
No cop will book me,
Wherever I park.

The sun is my planet,
I shall not fry.
Yay, though I dance in the doof-doof of the sleazy nightclub
No creep will hit on me,
Only nice guys.

The sun is my planet,
I shall not freeze.
Lo, though I snore in the depth of my sleep like a Harley
Love lies beside me,
Hugging my knees.

[swag]

2. Thanks for posting that, velvet.

This I particularly like because it made me laugh and because I like the way it sounds:

"Yay, though I dance in the doof-doof of the sleazy nightclub
No creep will hit on me,
Only nice guys."

[swag]

3. One from Virginia Hamilton Adair

The Dead Girls Are Dancing In Their Beautiful Dresses

Great-great grandmother Catherine, who came from Virginia
By coach to Kentucky with her chattels and Negroes,
Is dancing the dances with the plantation neighbors.
Henry Berry of Berryville will carry her away
Through the Cumberland Gap and on into the wilderness
Where few will be dancing or dressing for dances;
But now she is dancing the gay reels of Virginia.

Her daughter Virginia born deep in the Blue Grass
Is dancing with young Owen Bullitt the doctor
The grandson of Ann Clark of colonial Virginia.
He will die in the 60s and leave his Virginia
In the years of the war with their four little children.
She will live on without him a half-century longer;
But now they are young and the fiddles are playing.

Their daughter Ann Clark in her prettiest ruffles
Remembers the school years in the convent at Kenwood,
A Protestant child among Catholic schoolmates,
Nannie the naughtiest girl and the merriest
Dancing the waltz with a suitor named Henry
Into years unforeseen of poverty and sorrow;
But now she is moving with joy to the music.

Her daughter, young Katharine, most beautiful dancer
Whirls through the Kentucky fraternity dances
In beautiful dresses her mother creates for her.
Tomboy and Gibson Girl, grower of flowers,
Most loving and giving and laughing and weeping.
She will marry her Robert and move from the Blue Grass.
She will dance to the end and I still see her dancing.

And I their one daughter Virginia, who danced
Through New Jersey, New England, Kentucky, Wisconsin,
At Harvard danced into the great heart of Douglass
In the loveliest ball gown of pale rose lace.
For thirty-six years in his arms I was dancing;
But now my Beloved has ended the dancing
Till I join the dead girls in their beautiful dresses.

for the And you our one daughter, the bluest-eyed Katharine
In the arms of another dear Robert from Harvard,
Dance away with the living, dance into the future,
Have beautiful daughters in beautiful dresses
To dance on forever; but tossed by the music
Devote a wild instant of love and compassion
To the dead girls dancing in their beautiful dresses.

(7/69)

[Bullwinkle925]

4. My bellyfat shook reading that. Thanks for sharing.

"Abou Ben Adhem" (Leigh Hunt)


Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase!)
Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace,
And saw, within the moonlight in his room,
Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom,
An angel writing in a book of gold: -
Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,
And to the presence in the room he said,
"What writest thou?" - The vision rais'd its head,
And with a look made of all sweet accord,
Answer'd, "The names of those who love the Lord."
"And is mine one?" asked Abou. "Nay, not so,"
Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low,
But cheerly still; and said, "I pray thee, then,
Write me as one that loves his fellow men."
The angel wrote, and vanish'd. The next night
It came again with a great awakening light,
And show'd the names whom love of God had blest,
And lo! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest.

[swag]

5. Quite nice.

Thanks.

[BlueIris]

6. Let's call this a work in progress:

Yes, it's one of mine. I didn't want to get DU into any copyright trouble.

"At the Ascention"

He takes His throne,
radiant, His shadow
on the hall like cobra
charmed, His arrowed form
the gnomon of the world.

Watch over Him, gods,
prays the scribe from his far corner,
recalling fathers' tales
of the last of This order, taken
as reed by River in floodtime,
how the gash that split His crown
copied into a million men,
cleaved them clean
as papaya on market block
so it can be sold.

Watch over Him, Re,
Isis, Ptah, Anubis,
He is that most rare of gifts,
a promise kept
the best it can be,
a tree that can take root
if the soil encircling it holds.

Let it hold, Osiris,
and so the banks it clings to.
Should He owe obeisance,
use mine,
whatever clemency these reeds earn
transforming ink to scroll,
should you require sacrifice,
take me.