CASCADIAN FROG SONG FAREWELL

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It's the last day! April 30, and I've actually pulled it off—I've written a poem every day this month! Not only that, but the majority of them were written right on my blog with minimal editing. There are probably four or five I'll play with some more. 

Learning to trust the practice of writing and putting it out there at all but the same time did not come easily to me. Readers of this blog may remember I do an August postcard poem exchange, and Cascadian poet Paul Nelson, who co-founded this particular iteration of the exchange is also one of the main organizers of the Cascadia Poetry Festival which starts tomorrow night in Seattle! 

Today I'm off to Seattle for the Cascadia Poetry Festival. There I will be surrounded by so many poets I may just explode! I'm borrowing this précis of what it's about from Paul's SPLAB website: "There will be 6 poetry readings, 3 Living Room (free, democratic, open) reading sessions, five morning panels, one workshop and one talk given by an expert on Cascadia and bioregionalism."

And last night I was at the first reading by four Brick Books poets: Joanna Lilley, Karen Enns, Arlene Paré and Jane Munro. These ladies are about to go on tour across Canada. If they come to your city, check them out.  

In the realm of poetry, a lot gets said. As it is the last day of April, and therefore the last day of doing the poem-a-day exercise, I thank everyone who's read bits of my posts here and there and especially those who've taken the time to make comments. 

So, without further ado, today's poem. The prompt is to write a "farewell" poem. Anyone else hearing Seasons in the Sun by the inimitable Terry Jacks? (Hit that link and you'll be hearing it all day!)


In the Scheme of Things ~ Cascadian Frog Song Farewell


Last night a chorus of frog song sang me to sleep.
I knit a sweater of thoughts; knit one — sustainability,

perl one — persistence. Three minutes is all we have. 
Keep breathing. The treadmill of life is a real doozie. 

Silk Road beckons, waits with red tassels in its teeth.
Today we will buy milk and do taxes, for if only one of us

in the world is doing taxes, we all are, and if only one of us
needs milk, we all do. Last night, a frog chorus — 

which one started it, which one was the very first,
how do they know to join in? Do all species love to sing?

And suddenly it's spring! Not just ooh-the-sun-came-out-
for-ten-minutes-this-morning-and-it-was-actually-hot sort of spring

but full-on, all-day spring-shine that brings out new
leaf green on everything — water lilies in the pond,

fronds appearing, bite-sized, up from the ground of fern, 
new growth on fir tips, grass emerald-lush against 

stark of stone. The way things are going 
the frogs are probably chirping a prolonged farewell 

to the planet, the rape of which appears to be 
almost complete. We say goodbye to arms 

but find more places and ways to kill each other. 
Say we should do something about fossil fuels and water

and over-population while the spectre of Wasteland 
moves gently from possibility to likelihood.

Words are relegated to part of the unremitting babble 
brooked by technology. We give up day-dream time—

the brain's opportunity to file things,
the soul's opportunity to work on empathy

(which may or may not be a natural impulse)—
yet here we are this perfect day; frogs quiet,

pond still, leaves dancing in brindled sunlight,
a god's-in-his-heaven glad-to-be-alive day,

good for reflection and rejoicing,
and for that we are thankful.


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WORLD PEACE, BIOLOGICAL CLOCKS, MOM'S ADVICE, STAR WARS, A TWO-FER, LOCAL HERITAGE AND STAR WARS—WILL POSTCARD POEM MONTH NEVER END?

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I'm posting this a little earlier in the week than usual as I'm off for a few days. I'm heading to Kaslo to one of Holley Rubinsky's Writing Retreats. This time I get the little cabin in the field!

“will you want me when I ask you

                        to vacuum the stairs

            with the hose attachment?”

                                    Ian Williams

I have never subscribed

to the theory of attachment

I joke with my mother

about how she didn’t breastfeed me

so we didn’t bond.

Enough already. For years

I tried to detach myself

from her and what good

did that do? Built more

scar tissue. Now I can’t

even bleed.

“a poetry manuscript of a young man from Gaza, a sand hourglass,

and poem beginnings that flap like wings in my head.”

Ghassan Zaqtan

            But of what kind of wings do you speak,

            Ghassan? Insect—bird—butterfly,

            perhaps angel wings if you think

            that possible, wings on an airplane,

            chicken wings on your dinner plate,

            do you have a wingman,

            are you somebody’s? Do my questions

            put you in a flap, draw a line in the sand,

            I’m asking because I want to know

            as I chase my own words that

            disrupt the sky of my mind like a sandstorm,

            hour after lonely, beautiful hour.

“somewhere in this poem I could

tell you again the language binary

of computers is the same as that of poems”

                        Jennifer Maiden

            Mr. Crawford’s math class introduced me

            to the concept of binaries. The meeting

            did not go well. All those ones,

            chasing me around the room.

            Honestly, I’d rather have stripped

            naked in gym class than spent

            time on this. Oh wait—I did

            strip naked in gym class. That

            didn’t go well either. Now I discover

            all this somehow relates to poetry?

            That’s just fucked, and somewhere

            in this poem I’m going to tell you that.

“Light wants to fill dark with itself

            and have it still be dark

            so light can still be filling it.”

                        Alan Shapiro

I wanted to go to the dark side

but when I knocked, no one answered

there were bitten fingernails all around

the doorstep, obviously no one was home

I sang and sang but dropped the tune

I carried from a great height into

—where else—the abyss, or so

the abbess told me after I collected

my things,—one must always have

things when going to the dark side—

straightened my shoulders, my teeth,

my hair, and left for parts unknown.

“He howls with such fury and clarity

            I must believe him.”

                                    Brenda Shaughnessy

            Oh, that clock.

            that infernal, obnoxious,

            inconceivably (sorry!) ill-timed

            clock. The clock that

            does not tick—it clangs

            in a very Big Ben-esque

            way, wakes you up

            when you know you really

            just want to sleep in,

            and if you try to silence it

            —well. That clock

            will not be silenced.

The back of the card has this to say about the subjects in the picture:

The Doukhobor Historic Village

Castlegar, British Columbia

Handicrafts by Peter and Marie Oglow. Doukhobor ladles are

handcrafted from solid pieces of wood. These ladles make and (sic) ideal

practical or decorative gift. These ladles are a traditional utensil and each

one is created to keep the tradition alive.

Marie Oglow is seen here spinning yarn by hand. She later weaves this

yarn into cloth on a hand loom.

“The mountains are dreams rising from the lake.”

                                                David W. McFadden

            Note that the woman

            is afforded two lines—half

            that of her husband,

            her work deemed less

            and not worthy of complete

description. No mention of jams

and jellies made and stacked in

jars like jewels. No word of all

the magical food she prepares.

And those mountains behind her?

They set an example.

Keep her strong.

(February Sun is a poem by Victoria BC poet, Wendy Morton)

“may you stumble at last upon some band of Inuit

            hauling their catch of seal across the ice”

                                                James Pollock

            Almost a full moon. August, the

            caddis flies still sneaking in

            to get at the lights, the days shorter.

            My friend tells me of her trip to Labrador,

            of children and laughter and icebergs,

            the ice cold as a missed meeting.

            Imagine a piece of it coming away

            from its larger self, floating out to sea,

            the sea a giant drink complete

            with ice cube. Slaked thirst. Bottomless.

One of my many postcard poem friends, JI Kleinberg, posted this about the August adventure.

ModPo is happening again! Ten weeks of delving into Modern and Contemporary American Poetry with Professor Al Filreis through the University of Pennsylvania. It's a MOOC, offered through Coursera, same one I did last year but amazingly, there's still so much to be learned. The interaction on the forums is much less daunting this year, to me anyway. Today I was involved in a rousing discussion about William Carlos Williams' Danse Russe. 

And finally, in other poetry news, if you live in Cascadia make a note of the these dates: May 2–4, 2014, Cascadia Poetry Conference in Seattle. More details to follow. I'm determined to get to this one.

But first, Kaslo. 

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