CANDY

The book of poems

on that dusty shelf

has the collected works

of Wallace Stevens.

I can’t stand that b*****d,

but I owe him everything;

his little Tennessee anecdote

woke me up.

An old fox English teacher,

Mrs. Hull,

threw me right into

the heart of that briar patch

to play with the glass jar,

where I found a home better than

Brer Rabbit could have dreamed up.

And I’ve lived there ever since,

crawling around through everything

from D. H. Lawrence

to Bukowski and all the rest.

So, now, the cupped palms

on my hands hold enough

of time and space that sometimes

it drips off the ends of my fingers

to make something sensual

as the notes slipping soft

and sweet from Pete Fountain’s

Licorice stick.

Reviews

[Lisasview]

The mere fact that an English teacher, Hull, introduced you to reading and writing makes me oh so jealous.. or is the word envious!
I was never that fortunate.
I began writing what I felt when I was 10 years old, but never shared anything I wrote.
Last year I began posting my poems on WritersCafe and a whole new world opened up for me.
If you have a chance you might like reading more of mine.
Lisa

[Crowley]

I can't figure it out...lol, I just read another piece by Wallace Stevens just before this piece! Great writing and a good peek into the things that get us inspired and start and keep us writing. I was introduced to Wallace Stephens via Stephen King, he used The Emperor of Ice Cream as as a starter to the second half of his book Salems Lot. That one always creeped me out. I loved it. I too wrote a tribute pice to Stevens on this site not to long ago. Loved this and loved the story behind it.

[Vol]

He was SUCH an a*****e to his family, thus my problem with him. Additionally in the great search for meaning that infected the Modern Movement, every poet I've studied had a better answer than Stevens. Still, the theme and symbolism in Anecdote of the Jar opened my hungry eyes to almost everything literary.

[Crowley]

That's a good thing my friend because I enjoyed this writing.

[Vol]

Thanks, Man!