Talking to Myself and Others

Talking to Myself and Others

EARNEST
Really early this morning, we ate.
Earnest desires we have daily,
The trick is to do something great.
Sometimes I don’t know what.
I want to write an acrostic for each
new word I will try to memorize.
I listen to the droning lines on tv.

EARNINGS
Someday things will be different.
A person loves something about
Creation, Christmas, crows…
How will I talk about what’s needs
Are immediate.  This year’s new
Rutabagas, new lamb, new peas.

Rows of corn were planted again.
Ethanol for the cars we love our
Virtual freedom.  Karma exists I
Assume, but it’s a small progress,
California was a state to me, I fell
Head over heels in love there, but
I will tell myself I don’t care, and
Me?  I am a single mom.  It’s bad.

EARPHONE
Obligation, today a field trip,
Tomorrow not a place but to
Salvage ships and auction death.
New things must be designed,
In November brought to being.
You will breathe and find yourself,
And what interests.  We must find.

EARPIECE
Aviation was new, Amelia Earhart.
Friday it is and I’m looking through
Auto-biographies in the library.
Rook, the castle and swindler, look
Cleavage, that girl’s low-cut blouse
Evinces. Miss Daisy is up on her
Soapbox dressed like the queen of
England.  I’m here eating cabbage.
Theatregoers pass by Shoppers.

EARRING
A sunset evening finds the woman
Governing children. Time is too
Immediate, so precious years of
Lineage, the young years so quick.

EARSHOT
The evening is busy with children
In this park, I hear them, in this
Vicinity there is a church, the bells
Assure us that hours are intact.
Crudeness of an oil stain on fabric,
Here I wear imperfect clothes with
Sangfroid.  Accomplishment is
Hit-or-miss I feel; sense of victory
Makes the minute glorious, cute
Insouciance, the sovereignty we
All need to feel, it is about feeling.

EARTH
All about us each animal is bred;
D’Amato wants to keep them fed.
All humanity is spinning with this
Middling grossness caramel, camel
and carousel kink into themes of
Almost South America, Arabia and
Freaky circuses, Spanish & Arabic,
Adjutancy, today I am not just me.
Really weak in so many skills, the

PLANET
Calls to me like a lover: the pretty
autumn chill, as though frost were
Definite, the stark sun, bright not
Unctuous like potato chip meals.
Retrospect pink silk ballet slippers.
 
Hirsute sheep I dreamt of in sleep.
Aviary pictures of starlings, lists of
Antonyms and adjectives, adverbs
representing a random revelation,
Epiphany.  I learnt something new.
Tiffany is beautiful and cool, a girl
Sweet on diamonds and pearls.

EARTHBOUND
Careful progress letter by letter.
Heather on Heathcliff’s hill his
Omniscient castle, and I don’t see
my mother and father at the same
Robbery, each taking or giving or
indeterminately reporting theft.

EARTHEN
Autumn is stranger than life itself,
Sucking at my bone marrow, weird
Ugly duckling, I thought I could be
Idolatrous without error, only to  
Adore someone, from nowhere.
Friends meet in a quiet place, my
Adam that I borrowed for myself,
Rolling around in the free bed.

EARTHLY
Across the universe in jet planes,
Rachel wore Dela’s New Jersey
Too.  I wanted to look like her; I
suddenly realized all parents are
Imperfect and cannot always lead.

EARTHQUAKE
Retractable tables and chairs,
Eve saw them set up the event.
Ingrid wanted to go to high tea.
Doris wanted to run with an ape
Across the zoo, throwing popcorn,
Teddy her president for a while.
A telephone ring is a thing gone,
Dalmatians were a trick of frocks,
Antsy smocks for tempera paint.
My teacher’s had somehow gotten
Arithmetic lessons at a young age.

Reading was simple for me,
All I had to do was stare
At the page and that is all I did.
Someone would call to me and say
Hello, and I would silently draw. 

EARTHWORM
Shepherding the insect slayer. To
Hangout with the bugs outside, his
Impossibility becomes real, beside
Lumber, which cannot be ruined.
Shoppers for the raw material, I’m
Hired by this authority, this panel
under the sanction of the fireflies.
Luminary of every famous thing.

EARTHY
Aver that the earth is good, animal
Roasted a lesser part of growth.
Thingamajigs are inanimate except
Sanatoriums of robots where
impossible things are invented.

EASE
Confederation of activists, finest
Avenues with fine houses, this
Luminosity is one of spirit, our
Unlucky comraderies not shabby.
Thirsty for threadbare discipline.

No parent is perfect, ourselves
Offhandedly conceived often,
Confessional me, here he is,
Here he was, hush and wonder,
Untrue statements meant scaring
Thistle at sunset and the burrs.

TO EASE
Lummox of manners self-chiding,
Eucalyptus tree died; the flailing
Haphazard attempt to go on living.
Aviary dreams gone too, starlings
Confess, a fake swarm, they saw.
Euphoria of seasons and holidays,
Leniency making skills too weak. 
Lore speaks to me, I hope beyond
Euphemisms, the people not here,
Shellac is a thing I’ve finally lost a
Hankering for or love of, my fake
Aviation a craft of recycled plastic.
Confiding in this brief audience,
Hankies are made of paper now,
Reputable as the old world cloth.
Eat my unwearied soul. I find faces
Repulsive as my own some days.

You can see her on the EASEL

Confidence enough to go this way,
Aviators need their rest, risk of life
Near any runway; a body can be
Thinner drinking only water.  Thrift
Shopworn items, marked down.
Impostors at fairs standing in for
your old pals and acquaintances.
Unsure where to turn, I’ll buy a
Roaster chicken sometime soon.

EASILY
Booby prizes I got by the dozens,
Emulation a distant dream long
Conferred to the younger and less
Average; the elitists and models.
Lump in one’s throat halts her,
Unsure what to do, she is fruitless,
Thirsty to align past with present.

EASINESS
Conferences interest me. I am not
Averse to this type of work, but
Lengthwise slips must be squared
under petticoats or for drawers,
Thirteen ways of looking at folds.

EAST
Moved back to this side of the US,
I felt too far away and yet not,
Thinkable jobs and destinations.
Shells were Molly’s mollusks,
Residual slime of the sea shucked
Aversion only temporary, not a
Confession for Walruses, these
hapless oysters fit for carpenters.

Reviews

[Laura Lynn]

...a nice, bright question, I guess you have asked others, the first question... I want to consider that and the mother question as well. Thanks for you kindness. Being a mother is a great blessing very often when I look back and see how valuable it has made me feel for a little while often, especially when he was an infant, though it is the need that makes me feel valuable in such a way and they are lovely in the way life is so new everything so new for them. I guess the poem only means what it means what the words say for themselves standing alone. Of course they cannot stand alone. There are so many different threads here I'm not sure that I would have your attention to go through each line and what could have more said that I was not able to go into detail about, but it probably would not be worth your time were I to say so much,

[MrsBear]

I love the movement of this poem. But I must ask, what does this poem mean to you? Does it somehow relate to your life as a mother? But overall, great structure. (: