This is powerful, Larry. I long for the day when we stop pathologizing each others' differences, and I long for the possibility that we might just be able to make space for and accommodate each others' needs rather than making them a problem and a deficit.
I hear you Keith and say I am right with you! I was saddened that a beautiful act of true joy, more real and honest tnan most anything we'll hear or see in the election season, was so brutally and hatefully attacked over social media and on toxic media and talk shows. I expect most any parent would love to hear "that's my dad. that's my mom..." from their child of any age. I fear our culture and society becomes so cynical it can't recognize beauty and joy when they spontaneously manifest. Keep shining the light, friend.
This is wonderful, Lisa. It made me think about the ways in which we avoid, flee, circumvent the center of our selves much of the time—those odd, fascinating worlds that each of us are. I loved this!
Ooooh I reread this comment several times because it rings so true and is so beautifully worded - we flee the center of ourselves, those odd, fascinating worlds that each of us are! Beautiful and sad and true all at once.
You are amazing, Lisa, poetry, promots, sharing, writing and puns included! I did not feel slapped with your pun, but delightfully surprised! I iked the examples of absurdity you list--and thought to myself 'Yes!" So many times, a pun, bad or good, a corny joke or comment, has brought a bit of levity in tense and charged settings, and if nothing else, challenge the ultra serious to experiment wtih a smile! This morning, the fire alarm wernt off twice before church started, each time as ther choir started to pracice the anthem. As the fire trucks rolled and the fiefiohters asked asked what happened, I said, "the Choir must have been on fire! Each time they started to sing, the alarms went off!"
Haha I love how you found humor in what was probably not an entirely convenient situation. The choir is on fire! 🔥 And of course your generous heart took it to that positive pun rather than to allusions of brimstone.
Thank you, Michelle! Maybe I just keep encouraging everyone else to play so that I can feel good about how much time I spend doing exactly that? 🤔😂 Truly, though, I’m not sure it’s possible to play too much.
It is really interesting to me, too, how some people feel drawn toward questions (I’d bet most poets belong to that group) and others find rush as fast as they can toward other forms of end punctuation.
This is a home run, Keith! Powerful, provocative, and to my leftist progressive heart, all too honest and real. It feels just right for a spoken word piece--it flows beautifully well!
Lisa, we had a beauitful Labor Day weekend and as we walked along the ocean today, this ditty came to me watching an oil tanker waiting to enter the harbor. My apologies in advance!
So this might not immediately seem absurd, but it felt that way at the time -- watching my oddball puppy dig away at a rodent burrow for about 20 minutes while I sat with "good dog" Bjorn and had a personal reckoning with how much I'd changed up our sweet life together with the newcomer's addition. "Bad dog" Bob eventually came back with one of his nails torn and bleeding and an enormous grin on his face, seemingly oblivious to pain and my mini existential crisis. Anyhow, this poem came out of that. I messed around with indents that I won't try to replicate here; hopefully it's coherent enough without them!
Inspired by our glorious teacher, guide and prompter in charge, here is what came just now.
Absurdity
^
A teenage boy rises in ecstatic wonder
“That’s my dad!”
Wild clapping, tears flowing like happy rivers
an unbridled moment of joy in the forest
of these perilous times.
^
For those lost in forests of hate
and toxic stews of devastating dogma,
just another real human
to be ridiculed and belittled,
destroyed by sharpened spears of rhetorical absurdities.
^
Shallow apologies followed,
hiding behind “we didn’t know…”
he has disabilities, learning disorders
neurodivergent behaviors, as if the absence of those
would have justified their venom and vitriol.
^
How absurd.
That we call a splendid act of joy and love
outside the normative bounds of propriety,
when it should be the armies of hate, fear and self-righteous rage
that are the neurodivergent ones.
^
Stevie Wonder sings this day,
“We can heal our nation’s broken heart.”
You and me, repairs of the breach,
holy wisdom healers from a land far away,
first responders of love for all the broken places.
“First responders of love” - what a lovely ending, Larry! May there be ever more Guses among us!
Go gus
Red or blue or purple don't matter.
the ultimate father son woof.
Proverbs 23:24
Right on, Chuck!
This is powerful, Larry. I long for the day when we stop pathologizing each others' differences, and I long for the possibility that we might just be able to make space for and accommodate each others' needs rather than making them a problem and a deficit.
I hear you Keith and say I am right with you! I was saddened that a beautiful act of true joy, more real and honest tnan most anything we'll hear or see in the election season, was so brutally and hatefully attacked over social media and on toxic media and talk shows. I expect most any parent would love to hear "that's my dad. that's my mom..." from their child of any age. I fear our culture and society becomes so cynical it can't recognize beauty and joy when they spontaneously manifest. Keep shining the light, friend.
Carrion my wayward son
Haha yes!!!
Maybe I'm weird, but I immediately thought of carrion when I read the last line, and I loved it!
Then apparently you’re weird in the same way as me - I’m so glad!
Me too! 🧡
This is wonderful, Lisa. It made me think about the ways in which we avoid, flee, circumvent the center of our selves much of the time—those odd, fascinating worlds that each of us are. I loved this!
Ooooh I reread this comment several times because it rings so true and is so beautifully worded - we flee the center of ourselves, those odd, fascinating worlds that each of us are! Beautiful and sad and true all at once.
You are amazing, Lisa, poetry, promots, sharing, writing and puns included! I did not feel slapped with your pun, but delightfully surprised! I iked the examples of absurdity you list--and thought to myself 'Yes!" So many times, a pun, bad or good, a corny joke or comment, has brought a bit of levity in tense and charged settings, and if nothing else, challenge the ultra serious to experiment wtih a smile! This morning, the fire alarm wernt off twice before church started, each time as ther choir started to pracice the anthem. As the fire trucks rolled and the fiefiohters asked asked what happened, I said, "the Choir must have been on fire! Each time they started to sing, the alarms went off!"
Haha I love how you found humor in what was probably not an entirely convenient situation. The choir is on fire! 🔥 And of course your generous heart took it to that positive pun rather than to allusions of brimstone.
Hah! I tend to avoid that fire and brimstone stuff!
Very enjoyable and you raise a bunch of interesting questions, thanks.
Thank you, Weston! I appreciate that so much.
oh my gosh I love this pun 😂 and the directive to PLAY. thank you.
Thank you, Michelle! Maybe I just keep encouraging everyone else to play so that I can feel good about how much time I spend doing exactly that? 🤔😂 Truly, though, I’m not sure it’s possible to play too much.
writers and teachers, always talking to ourselves
So very interesting questions. It is strange to me that many I know do not ask the questions but choose to avoid them and secretly live in fear.
It is really interesting to me, too, how some people feel drawn toward questions (I’d bet most poets belong to that group) and others find rush as fast as they can toward other forms of end punctuation.
Lisa, forgive me. I posted a recently written poem on Substack but cannot remember where. So if it was here, forgive this duplication.
Stones
I will not leave the imprint
of my feet
into the stones of time
I will not tilt up
the stone monolith
reaching for the firmament
There will be
No stone burial marker
In the grass of the moment
I will be free
To not exist
Leaving no stones
Here's my attempt to explain a different strange planet, maybe not all that dissimilar to the colonized acorn gall?
***
As far as I can tell, it happened
right about the time
earth began revolving
round an axis of oppression.
An axis hewn from the aggression
of three unforgivable transgressions
colonialism
capitalism
patriarchy
These strands, when braided
created
a field so weird, so warped,
everything recalibrated.
Nature was no longer revered, but
feared and hated.
Lies became truth,
coercion celebrated.
Stealing land became “settling” it
And aggressors venerated
for defending land that wasn’t theirs.
Since then, there really is no more absurdity.
Unless it is all absurdity,
because the lies have multiplied and
the narratives are weighted --
heavy as gravity, holding us down.
Very good
This is a home run, Keith! Powerful, provocative, and to my leftist progressive heart, all too honest and real. It feels just right for a spoken word piece--it flows beautifully well!
Lisa, we had a beauitful Labor Day weekend and as we walked along the ocean today, this ditty came to me watching an oil tanker waiting to enter the harbor. My apologies in advance!
A pun is like
a bun in the sun,
Melted and withered like forgotten goop
or sweet and shiny like sultry soup.
Good or bad, it doesn’t matter
a pun is measured by the laughter!
So this might not immediately seem absurd, but it felt that way at the time -- watching my oddball puppy dig away at a rodent burrow for about 20 minutes while I sat with "good dog" Bjorn and had a personal reckoning with how much I'd changed up our sweet life together with the newcomer's addition. "Bad dog" Bob eventually came back with one of his nails torn and bleeding and an enormous grin on his face, seemingly oblivious to pain and my mini existential crisis. Anyhow, this poem came out of that. I messed around with indents that I won't try to replicate here; hopefully it's coherent enough without them!
.
The Newcomer
.
I sit with my good dog
while the bad one
.
strip-mines the meadow for small things
who shake in their tunnels and rue
our rest stop,
.
paddles earth and doesn’t give a lick
that the other is being fed snap peas
and petted and apologized to
.
for the whole month of February,
when I surfed Petfinder like there was
something I still needed,
.
for the subsequent blowout,
when ours became a hackling, barking home,
most recipients undeserving, like my son
whose hands are always gentle
and cupped with junk food on offer,
for my transformation into a squall
of leashes and training remotes and treats
and disclaimers to everyone everywhere
about my bad, bad dog,
while the good one
looks on mildly
to underscore which one I don't mean.
.
In the meadow at the knees of his
first-ever mountain, the puppy
puts down his mischief.
.
Bad snout soil-dusted and eyes bright
even though he hasn’t caught shit,
he trots over with that brand of glee that says
I know I am loved.
.
And I sigh because that is
actually true,
and give bad Bob
a snap pea too.