I've been going through old writing today and picking up threads of stories that I had always meant to finish. Just typed an email to a friend saying that now that I've finished one book I honestly think that I'll be able to finish another and another. But perhaps the sunshine and free time are making me a bit euphoric. Here's an old poem that I've been rewriting this afternoon.
Churchill
He pulls me away, with
a voice that equals your own,
strips you clean,
and leaves me knowing
incomparable middle class suffering.
Stands there with a strength
that comes from foreign places,
with names I can’t countdown,
places in the mine, places
where I have not yet spent time.
The next one had a reedy voice,
shiny shoes, short tie, lively banjo.
I couldn’t get that song out
of my head, enduring
train ride, a long walk, a whistle.
The fitness in his hands,
cracked, scared, calloused,
that when they touched me,
bear me to run away, a place
by the river, sweater that wasn’t mine.
Girl with titanium hip will rock. Girl with titanium hip will write. Girl with titanium hip will read. Girl with titanium hip will battle crazy-ass disease called Wegener's Granulomatosis. Now stuff that in your spelling bee!
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2 comments:
I really like this. Is "a place by the river" a throwback to Cohen's "Suzanne"?
Thanks for the kind words, John. Actually, the whole poem kind of writes back to Greg MacPherson's "Churchill." But I do like the pickup re: Leonard Cohen too. Goodness, I heart "Suzanne."
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