[lit-ideas] Re: Sunday Poem
- From: JimKandJulieB@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 14 Nov 2004 08:53:34 EST
THIS is why I'm subscribed. On a cold dready dismal Sunday morning fraught
with impending disaster, I find something that is smart, a bit of beauty,
that makes me smile. It's wonderful. Thank you.
Julie Krueger
========Original Message======== Subj: [lit-ideas] Sunday Poem Date:
11/14/04 3:06:24 AM Central Standard Time From: _ritchierd@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
(mailto:ritchierd@xxxxxxxxxxxxx) To: _lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
(mailto:lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx) Sent on:
Words are the sea in which we swim,
while waiting for the common hotel towel.
I claim to be bilingual,
speak both American and English.
Sometimes it seems true.
I am firm and soft, a mussel among mussels at high tide.
But other times, when I mingle,
I am but a waterless fish.
"Look," she said, "pants by Gap, Addidas jacket, Express tank,
FCUK shirt, shoes by Rita Blank."
My gears slip; the transmission fails. "Bra?"
I just wasn't with her so far.
Though unemployment's at seven percent,
with no worries about rent,
an acquaintance recently stopped dead,
just failed to go ahead.
He's not retired, he says, he's "re-charging."
I wonder what he means.
As we talk, he leans on his new Mercedes coupe, says,
"I was drinking too much of the company Kool-Aid."
I don't know what money he made,
but he seems to have the stuff in spades; he'll be in no soup.
I think that even if really he was laid off,
he's not going back; he's opting for being laid back,
opting to be permanently free of all who can hack it.
Students told me this week, "She's being a pris again.
First she was pris, then a goth, now this."
I weakly asked if what they mean is "being vain?"
No, they explained, a pris is just a miss who's prissy.
Talking with Stephen's widow about her new hip, I heard,
"I'm lying around in bed watching 'decorator porn' on T.V."
"Would that be those makeover shows?"
"That would be those makeover shows."
I quip about how hip her hip will be.
The guy who rented us the boat on Friday, for crabbing,
once navigated a bomber, a B52,
not what they called the "Big Ugly Fat Fellow," but one huge mother of a
plane.
He worked as a fisherman in Alaska,
then briefly killed people for a living.
He's now casual, coastal labor, who whiffs of drink.
He used to be over 'Nam.
He now says he's "over" it.
What makes me mention him
was how he talked of "gooks,"
which, by way of rhyme, reminded me of writing,
from a student who summed Exodus' violence thus:
"Moses could relate to God,
even though he was a little spooky."
As those kooky British aristocrats would say,
in phrasing that's now outdated, "Well... quite."
David Ritchie
Portland, Oregon
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