I was at a friend’s poetry reading last night. What is the question we writers always ask each other, but don’t like to be asked? Are you writing? A friend asked, how is your book of love poems comin’ along? Silence. I haven’t been writing. No lover, no love. Wait. That’s a lousy excuse. It’s been a long winter. Not an excuse–actually, it’s a reason I should have been writing. But I don’t own guilt or shame. I write when I write. Today, I wrote. I wrote silly little love poems. I wrote to write. I hoped being vulnerable would allow creativity to flow and something interesting, even one line or one word, would appear. Perhaps, it did.
When you are ready, pick a topic AND WRITE (until your sister calls and she tells you it’s 7 pm and you suddenly realize you haven’t eaten all day and you are hungry).
Note: illusive or ilusury?
Beauty of the Beast
I should have a diary of love poems, a page/
a poem for each love/each lover each year
each month each week each night
I have broken bread with beauty and
with the beast. I always loved the loving. Always
loved the movement of the moment, the song-
breathing high notes and then the low notes, and
again the high notes; the music mindful of the giving
of the taking. Heart to head, hand to thigh no
thoughts of time. No time to expect or to regret.
Only me/ not you. I am trying not to satisfy
or criticize or control. Just doin’ what
makes me happy. No poem written after/
or before captures the love/the loving
there is no diary.
Narrative for an online dating site:
She likes bowling. She doesn’t like biking.
She likes birds. She doesn’t like worms.
She likes boating. She doesn’t like swimming.
She likes chocolate. She doesn’t like coconut.
She likes rhythm and blues. She doesn’t like opera.
She likes motorcycles. She doesn’t like riding them.
She likes funky. She doesn’t like not funky.
She likes dogs. She doesn’t like cats.
She likes shoes. She doesn’t like socks.
She likes sunshine. She doesn’t like rain.
She likes walking. She doesn’t like hiking.
She likes Santa Clause. She doesn’t like the Easter Bunny.
She likes coffee, black. She doesn’t like sugar and cream.
She likes movies. She doesn’t like television.
She likes red. She doesn’t like yellow.
She likes libraries. She doesn’t like museums.
She likes memoir. She doesn’t like autobiography.
She likes talking. She doesn’t like listening.
She likes mustard. She doesn’t like ketchup.
She likes meat. She doesn’t like vegetables.
She likes hotels. She doesn’t like camping.
She likes wine. She doesn’t like whiskey.
She doesn’t like biking, hiking, camping, or golf-men who like younger women, or casual relationships. She likes a cigarette now and again.
Love is
like the loaves and the fishes, one damn miracle after another
it is the emperor with no clothes, nothing to hide; it is the frog
not the prince. Love is the family not the dysfunction,
the children and the grandchildren. Love is the future. Love
is the spoken and the unspoken—vulnerability and trust.
Love is awareness and action, not reaction. Love is to be afraid
but still take a risk. Love is the bird and the worm.
Imaginary 60-Year-Old Lover
—thanks to A. M.
You are:
responsible
accountable
mature
generous
kind
thoughtful
social
socially aware
skilled
active
playful
spontaneous
You laugh and smile and are
trustworthy
humble
forgiving
and you can’t live without me
I’ve got to love this silly love poem
because maybe it will love me back.
I will give it all I’ve got, but maybe
that won’t be enough. Nikki Giovanni
is the goddess of love poems, I want
to be a goddess of love. Silly poem
speak to me; I’m listening. Rise above
cliché and personal debauchery, deliver
substance and sustenance, sing to me.
Silly little love poem hear my wanton
cry and hit me with your best shot1
an arrow to the gut of lonely, the heart
of sorrow. Silly poem we’re stagnant,
we’re in doo-doo deep and dirty.
1.”Hit Me with Your Best Shot” is a song written by Canadian singer/songwriter Eddie Schwartz and recorded by American singer Pat Benatar in 1979—Wikipedia
I said “there is nothing left but love”
—after 9/11
but love is scarce while hate is abundant
no, hate is arrogant, love is unassuming
where are the lovers?
in coffee houses writing poetry about love and war
why is there war?
to create fear
what are we afraid of?
hunger
why are the children hungry?
wars are raging
where is the love?
fighting and fleeing war
what is love?
passion, compassion—revolution
how many poets, how many poems, how much war, how many revolutions
before love wins, hunger disappears, and poems are sweet-tempered?
I Said I Would Stay Home Today
and write love poems instead of chasing
the illusury lover or running from her;
instead of escaping the desire for love
by shopping or eating or playing the slots.
I thought I would stay home today and
imagine love to be something not to give
or to get, but to imagine it is heart like
tree, like sky, like earth, like bird; but,
there is interference. There is blizzard,
there is thunder and storm, earthquake
and tsunami.
There is illness, destruction and death.
Above poems by Sherry Quan Lee, first draft only draft, rrrruff draftSaturday, March 26, 2011
I think that’s true…especially if I’m not writing. I’ve come to feel a little guilty of late if I’m not writing, I’ve been given something and I’m not using it. So keep asking me, and then if we are both writing we have the right to vacation sometime. Together preferably : )
Up thinking still about the work we do and how much effort we put into our writing. Wheter we are doing it or thinking about it, rolling it through our minds…these were lovely. Thank you for sharing them.
Lovely to read about love on a Sunday afternoon, with soft spring rain and gray skies outside. Hope the arrow hits you on the right spot.
Enjoy!
So good to see you live and in person the other night. So wonderful to catch glimpses of your inner musings here. I’ll keep asking if you’re writing and hope you’ll keep asking me as well.