Bless the Moment: Poetry Here, Poetry Now

              The Disease of More.  Get more.  Take more. Be all.  Have it all.  If we write from the congestions and hungers of The Disease of More, we attempt to hoard all of a relationship, let’s say, in what I call “an Instaverse”:

I love you forever. 

You mean the world to me.

Better still, let’s tighten up:

You are my everything.

The word “thing” captures every-thing.  Okay.  Something I can carry on a microchip:

You are my thing.

            This poet might say, “It’s a poem everyone can interpret in any way they want.” There’s another “every” word, and “any.” And blah.  Yes, readers can interpret it in any way they want, but they won’t want to.  It’s unmemorable.  It’s all thought and no heart, no imagination, no novelty. And, really?  The loved one is a thing?  Eek! 

            Poet William Carlos Williams wrote,

"The local is the only universal, upon that all art builds…In proportion as a man has bestirred  himself to his own locality he will perceive more and more of what is disclosed and find himself in a position to make the necessary translations."

             Writing poetry is one of the antidotes to The Disease of More.  Through it, we are awakened to locality—the Now and Here—and find it to be enough.  Each time I notice and caress some detail in my life—it becomes sacred to me. I Bless the Moment.  That’s a nonsectarian “bless,” beyond any doctrine or religion.  

            While working on poems with other poets, I find that the poem is usually in the story the poet tells about the poem.  Here’s Olivia’s first draft, already imaginative and focused:

But only when Patricia asked about the picture did Olivia tell us that she bites her thumbs in anxiety.  That she gnaws on herself in anxiety, like a fox bites at the paw ensnared in a trap, is poignant, real, crucial.  That detail—her locality, her now, which she knew, but we, as readers didn’t—transformed the poem.  Too often, we ignore what is familiar to us—as if, because it’s just us, it’s unimportant.  It is my hope that, in putting on the page, Olivia might also find some healing for her internal struggles.

            Then it was time for a first draft from Patricia:

Floor

Sweeping the forever dusty hardwood floor until the veins in my biceps give way to flowing blood.

Noticing the pitter patter splats of acrylic paint on the floor, damn this splintery surface will never be spotless. 

Dangling tapestry of the glistening Moon 

and the relaxing blue Buddha meditating 

into a life of enlightenment...

My room is almost done.

     We were workshopping through Google Meet, so Patricia was able to show us the tapestry of the Buddha.  

    

Patricia blessed her moment, and revised the poem to better capture her experience of it:

Buddha Tapestry

Above the copper chocolate carpet

Hangs the Blue Buddha

On the blue lily pad

Glistening halo

I hang him

Where my eyes

Catch the sunlight

Auras of bubble thoughts

Floating into abyss

He hugs the room

The demon is awake

Om…

What didn’t come through in Patricia’s first draft, was that she loves to sweep the carpet in her room.  A second poem was born of her “Floor” draft, as she blessed the moment:

Sweeping the Carpet

All night, the Guinea Pigs

Browny and Dusty

Run wild

Squealing like piglets

Sprinkling shredded carrots 

Flairs of half eaten Petco Hay

Across the old 90’s remixed 

Blocks and patterns of

Copper chocolate carpet

Their art

Stuck 

Like stubborn babies

My broom is the bottle

Firm grip

Steady pose

My steady broom

Shush, Shush

Dusty leaves her marks

In the dust pan

    

            I start each blog post with a public image for which I search.  This time, I posted one of my own—which I’ve had for years, but, as often happens in an Instagram world, never gets looked at again.  And here it is:

Photograph for a Teachable Moment

Queen Anne’s Lace—umbelliferous fractal of petals—

self-planting, anchored in your wild carrot root—

like baby’s breath, a filler for my garden bouquets—

zinnias, snapdragons, hydrangeas.

Among the archived photographs I never harvest

into albums, or post on Facebook—

the four beetles crawling your dome,

like gardeners, janitors with rakes.

The messages in your petals—

the bridal veil, the tiny orchidy blossoms

pointing their fingers at the bearded man

with whirly eyes, softly looking for me.

Works Cited:

Dalessandro, Olivia A.  “I bite my thumbs.”

Dennis, Patricia M.  “Floor,” “Buddha Tapestry,” “Sweeping the Carpet.”

Williams, William Carlos. The Autobiography of William Carlos Williams. New York: Norton,

1951.

     ---. Selected Essays of William Carlos Williams. New York: New Directions. 1969.

Art:

Dalessandro, Olivia A. Blog: https://www.instagram.com/urpoetrymother/ 

Blue Buddha: https://trippystore.com/products/buddha-bubble-blue-tapestry?variant=14238575657013&currency=USD&cmp_id=1746518282&adg_id=70171879564&kwd=&device=c&gclid=Cj0KCQjwj7v0BRDOARIsAGh37iphIJ4YyrolEj2bdvuScRoqLY1ccXGDTcJ-Pt8D4UmQzSEies2rCS8aAsbjEALw_wcB