Poem TA Delmore Quote Rimbaud

Outward Signs

Mom did not take
Paxil or Prozac, she had
alcohol and nicotine to bed
this fetus. Me!
It was the fifties
where not knowing and caring
were sub-rewards of a World
War victory.

Upon my birth
no tremors or shakes, ‘cuse
the right balance of smokes
and wine made a space
in my brain. All I had to do
was look at my name bracelet
to know who I was
and flip it convex to know
a fallen St. Christopher
was protecting me.


"Genius is the recovery of childhood at will." Rimbaud

Book Work and Poem TA Delmore

Ledge
In my parents house was a wretched ledge.
Unspoken, distant, loathing. Rod of Oak
That was destructive, not creative.
A stick that was leaned on during the rosary-
Visible reminder.
Catching thighs with stinging accuracy
Like tipping a clumsy steer for branding. Striking
Cruel, rising stiff. Injurious wood
Used in a wild dance named prayer.

I have been working on a book more off than on over the past twenty years on a way to heal the inner wounded child. It has always been sitting in that risky place of wonder what others will think or can I pull this writing together. Focusing outward seemed like a good place to work from, but much has coursed my blood in those years as Rilke aply puts it. Last night I went to my disorganized files and found my pieces and many distractive things I have not seen for years. I brushed them aside except for articles that pertain to this writing. For those who read my Blog keep me in your thoughts and prayers as I move toward this light.

Rollo May quote My Poem

We recall the studies of especially creative people that were made by Frank Barron. Dr. Barron showed his cards—cards with many different drawings and paintings on them—to creative people and their counter-parts, people who weren't especially creative, asking them to pick out the cards they liked best. The latter group chose the orderly cards; they liked things to be clear, understandable, uncluttered. But the creative people chose the chaotic cards. The most striking thing about the creative people was this taste for chaos. They preferred the scribbles where there was no form whatever; they found a challenge in the chaos. They yearned to make form out of it, “to make of the chaos about them an order which is their own,” as Henry Miller puts it. This is the purpose of their existence. This is the fundamental creative aspect of all human beings whether they are especially talented or not.
The human imagination is shown in these strivings—which may sometimes be passion and sometimes simply curiosity—to put things into form. It's what Einstein did when he proclaimed that matter and energy are related in one formula, E = mc2. Our human mind is continuously doing that, obviously on a lesser scale.
—Rollo May from My Quest for Beauty


This Moment

More people are walking
Into traffic; so terrible
So traumatic.
A few get run over
More than once
Shape-shifters
Coyote, armadillo.

We follow human outcome
On the teli, in the paper, from
No name to identification
To obituary.

Many times there is no
Summation, was he/she,
German, Irish, Sudanese?
Did I attend school with them?
Did she work for my dad?
It behooves me to demystify.

Yesterday
A road side bomb killed 35.