Try The Sestina, It's Delicious!

I had the privilege, when I lived in Florida, to participate in several workshops with the poet, Peter Meinke.  Peter is an expert on poetic forms and during one of his workshops he suggested, after a critique of my poem, that I might enjoy writing a sestina.

The poem was 'Velvet Boy', published in The New Delta Review (Summer 2006, Vol.23, #2).  I wrote narrative poems in free verse (unrhymed verse without a metrical pattern), but I liked challenges and often imposed restrictions on a poem, whether it was the length of lines, the repetition of a word, or in the case of 'Velvet Boy', a different mention of fabric in each verse.

VELVET BOY

When he is face down in a pillow
Velvet Boy wonders if love tastes like linen.
Sometimes he grips the bedsheet
pretends it's a magic carpet and he is Aladdin
flying above the boulevard and the cars
and the freaks and bloated johns.

Tonight's trick is drunk and white
as chenille in moonlight, and Velvet Boy,
his face pushed into the pillow,
feels each grunt and thrust and wishes
whiskey didn't smell like dreams;
wishes dreams didn't sound like johns.

Later the john snores in cottony breaths,
a pillow hugged to his chin.
Velvet Boy lifts a fifty from his wallet
to fill in the cracks where fantasy can't.
Through the motel lobby, he runs
like a shadow hiding from light.

On the boulevard, traffic runs slow.
A Cadillac pulls up to the curb
and a john waves a hundred out the window.
Velvet Boy slips him a smile like satin.
He knows this life will swallow him whole,
a pillow pressed over his face.

Meinke encourages poets to explore forms: the sestina, the pantoum, the villanelle, and sonnet, among others.  'Without knowing these forms, how will you know what your poem wants to be?'

Since his workshop, I've been an ardent admirer of poetic forms, namely the sestina and the pantoum.  I've met with some success in both forms.  I labored over a villanelle for the better part of three weeks once, and though I like the form, I sure as hell don't want to write it.

I recently discovered the 'golden shovel' poem, an acrostic form, you can read one example here.  Another poet friend sent me her attempt using a Dorothy Parker poem and it was thrilling to read.  "You have always told me to try forms and now I understand why," she told me.

There is something liberating in restriction.  Yes, I said that.  Like the sestina, a 'golden shovel' poem has the last word of each line already determined and the poet is cornered, forced to write his or her way out; almost like writing the poem backwards.  Using these forms, the poet must reach further for words, walk around them and see them from different angles, manipulate them and bend them.  The joy is finding a new phrase, a brazen image, or a clever twist in a definition.  There is poetic ecstasy found in punishing line breaks and enjambments, both tools are necessary in the 'golden shovel' and the sestina.

I have heard many poets (and it's painful to hear) that they 'only write free verse because it's easier', and they have no interest in studying or trying out other forms.  First, I have never considered free verse easy.  Poets, whether formalists or free verse, labor over words, syllables, rhythm, line breaks.  I remind poets that poetry is also a visual art form, sometimes the way the poem looks on the page can influence the way it is read.  Chances are, if you think writing free verse is easy, your poetry probably sucks.

I'm no expert on poetic forms, but I am a fierce advocate of the poet's obligation to know them.

Live Exceptionally

Earlier this week, following a quote by Beat poet, Gregory Corso, a post in which I commented on his death from prostate cancer, a friend wanted to know how he lived.  I replied, 'he was a poet.  He lived exceptionally.'

I doubt Corso lived the high life, poets are generally not well-paid, or even paid at all, so I wasn't referring to his exceptional lifestyle.  Nor did I mean to imply his history with the Beat Generation, although that is something exceptional (and for this poet, a bit enviable).

What I meant by 'living exceptionally' is the gift of having a poet's sensibilities.  Poets look at everything, and they see it through a prism of language and detail.  The poet sees the whole universe in a mote of dust.  The poet grasps an entire lifetime in the dash on a tombstone.  The poet feels an entire symphony in a dying note struck on a piano.

That is living exceptionally.

It snowed most of the day here in the Big Woods, but this afternoon it has all but stopped, save for the tiniest glints of crystal still swirling in the air, visible only because a half-hearted sun is shining through the gray clouds.

That is living exceptionally.

My dog, Joey, is curled next to me on the sofa as I write, blissfully dreaming his dog dreams and every few seconds his front paws twitch and his brow furrows as if he's digging for imagined rabbits.  To play witness to his dreaming...that is living exceptionally.

Later tonight, I'll pour a finger of good Kentucky bourbon, turn off all the lights and stare into the reflected brightness of a waning full moon on the new snow.  I can thing of nothing more exceptional to do this evening.

This week, as I rummaged my brain for a poem to write, another friend complained about the winter squalls moving through the area.  There were some untamed images running around in my head, but until I read the word 'squall', I'd been unable to put them into a poem.

After writing the poem, I thanked her for giving me the word 'squall' and she replied upon reading the first few lines that perhaps she had been too harsh in her opinion of the weather.

'It is the poet's privilege to experience the world differently,' I replied, thankful to be living exceptionally.

Poet Alone

I stand at a crossroads; to live alone, or welcome someone into my life again.

In April, it will be three years since Jeff died.  The intense grief is gone, a memory now.  In 21 years together, he rarely bought me a gift.  It may sound callous to some, but I learned his death was his greatest gift to me.  He gave me the freedom to write.

I hadn't written much in the ten years before his death and less than 48 hours after he died, I wrote a poem.  Then another, and another.  Poems of grief.   That November, I wrote 30 poems.  In the two years since moving to Iowa, I've written over 100 poems.

I can't recall the author, maybe Doris Lessing, who believed a writer needs to live alone.  Even if she didn't say it, I think there are many poets and writers who believe this.  I think I'm a believer too.

It's not that I've written volumes of fantastic poetry, there are probably only a handful worthy of publication.  The thing is, living alone, I've been able to write poems whenever I felt like it.  I can turn off the television, play classical music, stare mindfully into the night sky, and imagine lines of poetry.  There's no one here to ask what I'm doing, and the dogs are content to nap beside me while I write (Joey's doing that right now).

On the other hand, I'll be 53 in March.  I'm definitely not dead and still find men attractive.  Though I relish my quiet and solitude out here in the Big Woods, I have sacrificed any chance of meeting someone (Iowa recognizes gay marriage, but that doesn't mean we're hanging out on street corners in small towns).

I could go to a gay bar, but that's a good 45 minute drive, and I'm not exactly into the bar scene.  I  joined an online dating site, but it's proved an empty pond and a waste of money.

All this has kept me up nights thinking about what the rest of my life is going to be like.  Perhaps I'm fretting too much and should just let things play out, however that plays.

The season of waiting

Winter has taken aim and humbled those of us living in the Midwest and the Northeast.

It was 15 below the other night, with a windchill of -40.  Tonight, temperatures will begin a steady decline and Monday's high temperature is expected to be -15.  The high.  MINUS FIFTEEN DEGREES!  In some areas of northern Iowa (that would be here in the Big Woods) the windchill factor may reach -60 degrees.  We are being warned that frostbite can occur within 5-10 minutes in these temperatures.

During the winter, I drive a 1996 Blazer with 4-wheel drive.  It's a workhorse, but it's cold-blooded.  Even parked in the garage, I keep a battery charger plugged into it.  It is no guarantee of it starting up.  I'm not so certain it will start when the temperature turns arctic on Monday.

The poet, Linda Pastan, calls this 'the season of waiting'.

We've entered the very depths of winter.  Bone-chilling, perilous cold, the threat of snow and ice and treacherous roads.  Weather fit for neither man nor beast.  My two dogs, Jack and Joey, waste little time doing their business these days.

We wait out these severe weather alerts, crawl under the covers at night, fall into a sleep that will be quickly forgotten when we venture out to our vehicles, and pray the engine turns over and we let it idle for 10 minutes to warm up.

I have a big pot of chili simmering in the slow-cooker today, thick and hearty with black beans, kidney beans, lentils, onion and green pepper, tomatoes, and soy burger.  Nothing will taste as good tonight when the winds pick up and the arctic comes to Iowa.  It is worth the wait.

There is little to do in this waiting season.  I read books and write poems.  I putter around the house, organize my closets, sift through dresser drawers, bake loaves of bread and try new recipes.

We settle into our 'long winter's sleep', pray we remain safe in our warm homes.  We dare not think of spring yet because we know February can be the cruelest month of the season.

So we wait it out, imagine winter is a survival test and we must steel ourselves against all attacks.  We will be under siege for the next few days, hunkered down and paying respect to nature's ferocity.

While we wait, we practice patience.