With this current round of novel edits winding down I’ve been getting back to poetry. First putting together sets for my two (so far) up coming summer features. I aim to make them both different and to have mini-chaps books to sell of the pieces I do. For the Art Bar feature I’m focusing on down east/childhood material I’m calling Brown Betty.
April was poetry month. I didn’t try this year, as some did, to write and post a new piece every day. I wrote something nearly every day though. Some was work on Lazarus Kiss, some work on my novel about coal miners (Coal Dusters) and even poetry.
My current poetry project, other than getting things ready for features & open stages, is to do a series based on the titles of the essays of Montaigne. I read the essays over the past couple of years – they do go on. I really enjoy working with prompts and as there over 100 of these essays I have prompts to keep me going for a couple of months. The pieces will be based on title only, not on the content of the essay.
Reading them once was enough. Here’s one of them:
Of Sorrow (2)
missing
those moments when we glanced
across a subway track
opposite directions
that frequently converged
paths that will no longer cross
<>
missing you
yet still seeing your wave
as you get in the subway car
or I get in mine
a frantic little dance
not caring who sees
or perhaps caring who saw
wanting them to see to know
you were willing to look so silly
at your age
at my age
showing a world of strangers
that we care for each other
across a the subway tracks
<>
different platforms
different directions
paths that will never
cross again
TOpoet 