poetry challenge day 4. Complex Rhyme

I cried 3 times just now watching Obama honor Biden

and then Biden deflect the honor back to Obama. No one

could ever convince me their love for each other, their families

and their country is an act, is anything less than genuine.

Obama and Biden. I remember when Obama first chose Biden

I thought, Obama and Biden rhymes with Osama Bin Laden,

how strange is that? It's not a simple rhyme either, but a complex

multi-syllabic slant rhyme. It seemed beyond random; six

syllables, it would be pretty difficult to come up with one

better than that. It's practically inspired. What could it mean?

Was it a sign pointing to the fact that meaning doesn't reside in

names? Or did it indicate the very nearness of meaning

between the two, the way a change in only a few consonants

between one set of names and another could, for instance,

be the difference between the good guys and the bad?

Though of course I'm trained not to believe in good and bad.

That's something you learn if you read enough books,

that there is no bad without good, black without white,

everything's grey, it's all relative, each side thinks they're right,

etc. After all, Osama Bin Laden was a man who loved his family,

his people, his God, as much as Barack and Joe do. Maybe

that's what this oddly uncanny rhyme was trying to tell me?

I mean it's a private lesson, really, because most people won't

believe it means anything at all, and whether it does or doesn't

really doesn't matter in the end. What matters is I took the bait

fate put in front of me in the form of a poem, rhymed a villain

with my heroes and thereby stepped into someone else's skin.

Who was Bin Laden? Why did he do what he did, would I have

done the same if I shared his name? If I lived where he lived?

It's such a complicated rhyme isn't it? I love Obama and Biden

but don't know how to feel about the murder of Osama Bin Laden.

7 day art challenge day 3

Lucia sitting on
Christopher Walken's Head
Petting poodle purse

7 day challenge: day 2

Woke Up Like This

My body disappeared away I turned
Away into the night like a thief had
Taken me away a ghost his prey I
Feel it don't feel it a surge of negative
Energy for one disappearing instant
An ember floating up out of a fire
A shooting star in reverse a speck
Going dark and then poof it's black
I speak but can't hear myself at all
Sound in a vacuum no room any
More you there next to me no more
Me I can't breathe nothing to breathe
Even the air has disappeared I suck
In with failing force until I suck myself
Inside out not even smoke comes out
Silence not a sound no matter not
Even nothing no trace left except you
Possibly as if I knew a few black lines
On a page of digitized air until a solar
Flare zaps the cloud and then even
this no longer there to feel any more

7 day challenge: 1

SOUNDBITE

Paul Höldengraber talking to Laurie Anderson at the New York Public Library:

Paul: You know, um, in preparing for tonight and preparing to speak to you and immersing myself in you and your work I've been so taken by what takes you and particularly by the work of your master, I don't know exactly how to pronounce it but, Mingyur Rimpoche, and learn from you what you've learned from him and in some way find a way for you to introduce him to me because I feel I could use him very well, because he said something that I find so extraordinarily moving and in the context of ending with "yes," he seems to be saying yes, all the time, in the face of terrible things, he continued somehow to think that the purpose of our time here is to be joyous and happy despite. And, well, we might be talking about loss and sadness, but he says one of the exercises we need to endeavor is he says we need to feel sad without being sad and I just find that extraordinary.

Laurie: So do I. What a great thing to practice.

Paul: And I just want to know how one practices it, what it means, tell me everything.

Laurie: Can I just tell you a few things? I'm just a beginner. I'm drawn to him because he's technically the happiest person in the world according to the Madison University's neurological department. He won the contest. You do it through, apparently they measure this through sound somehow, a way to measure equanimity, as opposed to like, for example, cold-heartedness, you play these sounds that are kind of horrific and it's a way to evaluate how reactive you are, how much you're like, ahhhh! how much you're able to control your mind and know your mind, he's a

Greek know yourself kind of guy, he has this concept of monkey-mind, as many Tibetan Buddhists do, of the mind that's going, "What's over there, What time is it? What's this thing? I better check my phone." (I do need to check my phone, good I just reminded myself of that.) So anyway, the idea is that to try to, if anyone has done this, you probably have, if you control your mind, just try to write down what went through your mind in the last 20 minutes and you read it and you realize, "This person's insane! How could this?" You know, talk about jump cuts, Melville did this, you know, whrrwhrrwhrrwhrr. So the study is to try to understand what your mind is and people like Burroughs had another way to do, he had the idea of this detective, one side of your mind looking at another, and it's a kind of dark investigation, and I just remembered one of these things, "I woke up and somebody was holding my hand and I realized it was my other hand holding that hand." So integrating yourself in ways in which you are the actor and the editor are ways which are really fascinating for me, but for me meditating is exactly like making art, it comes down to one very very very simple thing, just wake up, just be aware, that's it.

what to do when you're bored

What To Do When You're Bored

This is a poem for all the kids out there who are bored.

Actually, it's not really a poem, because I don't really know

what a poem is. I call everything a poem. Unless it is clear

I am writing prose. Right now I am almost writing prose,

but I'm not. I'm going to tell you, in poetry, how to entertain yourself.

First, don't play any video games. They are not a good use of boredom.

Better to lie on your back and look up at the ceiling than play a video game.

And TV isn't much better. Books are the best

except for lying on your back and looking at the ceiling.

What's on the ceiling? Sooooo boring.

What happens to boredom when you dive in?

Eventually it becomes everything.

I could just keep writing like this.

It's easy. Especially because no one will ever read it.

I mean you will, and that's what matters.

What To Do When You're Bored

This is a poem for all the kids out there who are bored.

Actually, it's not really a poem, because I don't know

what a poem is. I call everything a poem. Unless it is clear

It is prose. Right now I am almost writing prose,

but I'm not. I'm going to tell you

in poetry how to entertain yourself.

First, don't play video games. They are not the best use of boredom.

Better to lie on your back and look up at the ceiling than play a video game.

And TV isn't much better. Books are the best

except for lying on your back and looking at the ceiling.

What's on the ceiling? Sooooo boring.

What happens when you dive in?

Everything.

Found palm, Sophie's spelling words

trail of tears

My friend Dee Casalaina sent me a poem I sent her in 2007, the last year of Bush presidency. I don't remember writing it, a rushed, frustrated, weird apostrophe, obviously written off the top of the dome, but I thought it was interesting that it mentions Trump. I guess even then he was a symbol of greed for me.

Trail of Tears

America, it is time for a new aesthetic,

one based on rhythm and harmony.

(A thousand poets are writing through me.

It's a bit uncomfortable. Quit needling me, Berkson!)

America, count your blessings.

Count your antique roadshow baubles,

count your heritage! America, your heritage

is the future. The past should rest in peace,

well tended the grave. We love you America,

with your Elvis and soft serve and especially

jazz, and most especially that weird folk stuff

from Harry Smith's Anthology, and also

Buddy Holly, Little Richard,

The Meters, The Ramones,

Bonnie Prince Billy, Lou Reed,

Billy Holiday, Bill Monroe,

Abercrombie and Fitch. Whoa!

And there's the glitch

that stops the flow that stops the go

of Mr. Toe. Okay, what gives America?

I mean, this morning I'm wondering

what stick is stuck in that wheel?

Greed? Greek Tragedy!

I'm just wondering if we should look around.

Hey, there's Ivan Suvanjieff.

What's ya doing, Ivan?

"Laying water pipes in India with the Dalai Lama, man.

There's a horrific water crisis happening here right now."

Let's go to India with Ivan. Sounds like a good plan.

Hey, there's the King!

Hey King George, why are so many good people dying by our hands?

He's covering up his ears.

Dear God of him, please help him the death throws hear.

Hey, there's Ed Dorn.

The old gunslinger is singing,

"Hey America, this is Poetry calling."

I'm disguising myself as prose,

America, so I may speak Frankly to you.

Let us rally a different kind of troop, a dupeless troop

who scoops up the scuds and transforms them into doves

Let us, upon a tired trope, sprinkle nothing but poesy,

pulled out of the mouths of the dying swans,

such I mean, go to the country with William,

drink from the lake, taste weed and dirt.

Hey, apostrophe, over here!

The Trump of the Stationation,

the MTV Sweet Sixteen,

recently referred to by Jason Heller

as pretty much the most pure manifestation

of evil ever, and yet we can all laugh

because it's funny, because it is funny though,

Berrigan, it's a laugh riot. No? It's really

very boring, gosh! cloying, somebody

hand me a guitar...

Where was I, America?

I was calling on you, in doggerel,

shouting to you, to come to arms,

to fall into our arms, tired and poor,

and we will nurse you back to health,

amuse you back to mirth, birth

you back to self, and then, America,

when you are well fed and well rested,

we will send you out to help.

Raise your arms!

This is an arms race.