April 9: Poem 9

I used to think

Poetry

was a maiden in milky dress
amid fields of poppies
nigh crystal streams

But now I know

Poetry

is more often

a dead squirrel 
sprawled on hot blacktop
with its guts exposed
looking like
cranberries

or 

a festering sore
that won't stop oozing
because you just can't
stop picking at it

So now

I like 

Poetry 

better.

Notes

I am going to be teaching a poetry unit when I return to school after spring break, and I'm thinking about what I might want to say to my students as we dive in. I don't know if I'll share this poem (they're in eighth grade - so maybe)... that squirrel image is in my brain since I saw it when I was about ten and riding my bike. I didn't want to look, but I couldn't stop looking.

I struggled with the word 'nigh' in the third stanza. The word is typically used for time, whereas I use it here for location. I was going to change it, but then I thought about Ophelia, and how she dies in water even though she is largely the character in this image; I suddenly liked how this foreshadows the rest of the poem; it is a hint that she's 'near' the stream, but also 'near' the stream, because danger is right there and she's about to do something perilous. I also went back and forth between 'fields of flowers' and 'fields of poppies', because flowers has better alliteration, but poppies is more specific; I erred on the side of specificity. I think it is usually better to err on the side of specificity, when given the choice. 

I also like the juxtaposition of the two darker images... the dead squirrel is something you cannot control, and you are trying to make sense of; it's already dead. The sore is something you are doing to yourself, and you are trying to figure out why. These seem to be two of the bigger 'trends' in the poetry I am attracted to: why did this happen, or why do I keep doing this? 

Finally, I am pleased that I'm doing these 'notes' sections. I argue all the time to my students that writers are very intentional about their choices for things in what they write. By showing my thought process 'in real time', I'm making the case that this is true.