Interlude 2

My mom is awesome and she called me and helped me work on my poem. I think it's much improved.

Interlude              

The engine stills & begins

to cool. I chuck the keys in

my coat pocket & slip out

the door into the thin gap

between cars, careful no scratch

is left behind. Slate sky somber

above me, I smell potpourri,

as if a bonfire of dry flowers

smoldered in the backyard.

I remember testing vials of orange

& lemon oil in a fragrance store

with a girl when I was younger,

not yet wrapped like a bouquet

with memories laced to perfumes

or background music. It was winter also

& we hurried back to the car, missing

the crisp air around us & avoiding

the melting patches of ice.

I adjust the scarf bound

around my neck, & listen

to the old lady scuffing down

our slow street, crunched leaves beneath

her steps & mine. A short space

connects the car & home;

it is a routine walk & I reach

the welcome mat in moments,

cold hands digging

for house keys. I'm still breathing in

the strange smell, like crushed

lavender & mint.

Then I’m out of it, into a room

with stagnant old carpets, dusty

tiles, & closed windows.

Stuck inside day after day,

I forget at times the aromas

growing like vines against my gate.

I forget that in an empty January,

I live here with dried rose petals

& beckoning cedar branches.

Interlude

So, my poetry class has us writing a poem a week, which is awesome. This is this weeks poem which I hope you enjoy. If you have any comments before tomorrow afternoon, that'd be awesome. If you have comments later on, that'd be awesome too. See? I'm easy to please.

Interlude             

The engine stills & begins

to cool. I chuck the keys in

my coat pocket & slip out

the door into the thin gap

between cars, careful no scratch

is left behind. Slate sky silent

above me, I smell potpourri,

as if a bonfire of dry flowers

smoldered in the backyard.

I remember grazing on vials of orange

& lemon oil in a fragrance store

with a girl, when I was younger,

not yet wrapped with dried memories

attached to the perfumes & the music.

Outside, it was winter also;

we hurried to the car & missed

the crisp air around us, the remnants

of melting ice & of innocence.

I adjust the scarf bound

around my neck, & listen

to the grandmother scuffing down

the narrow street, crunched leaves

beneath our steps. A short space

links the car and home;

it is a ritual walk & I reach

the welcome mat in moments,

cold hands digging

for the keys, still breathing in

the strange smell, like crushed

jasmines, lavender, & mint.

Passing the days inside,

I forget the sounds & scents,

growing like vines against my gate.

I forget that I live here, beside

the empty January

rose bushes & bare cedars.

March 31st, 1990

Well, now that I'm in a poetry writing class again, I'll hopefully have lots of poems to put up this semester. This poem was inspired by "In the Waiting Room" by Elizabeth Bishop. Enjoy!

March 31^st, 1990

In Princeton, New Jersey, feet touching

the cold basement of my grandfather’s

home, I dusted off glass cases of old

books and leaflets, science notes illegibly

scratched in. Everything was gray

in the early dawn. I was the first

awake, listening for shuffled steps

to descend the staircase, waiting

for the breakfast clatter of pans,

smelling here the archived newspaper ink.

Published six years before in 1990,

pristine on the wall, I found the one

article I’d heard of from my mother,

about my grandfather and his space telescope.

A color picture of him, black in his hair

accompanied by familiar cloudy strands,

his eyes open and aimed like a camera,

his mouth grinning with the discovery

of something larger beyond the printed page.

Through his window, the purple sky was pricked

with white suns littered in the distance

and worlds blurred in the blackness.

There was a photo of the launch, poised

to leave me behind, now that I had found it.

Outside, crew boats on the lake were calling,

breaking the deathlike silence

and I wanted to call out to my mother

about what I’d found: my grandfather suddenly

new to me and greater than the world.

Asleep beside my grandmother upstairs,

was he dreaming of swirled galaxies

or coffee? Soon I thought I heard his youth

spiral down the stairs to breakfast

and I went up to meet a boy my age,

even if my grandfather looked old. With a grin,

he poured me orange juice and let me ask

if it was true, if we could see through time

the longer and deeper we peered into the blackness.

It was the year before he died and the gray

was lifting off the morning like my flight home,

but his pupils were as clear as a northern night sky.

Fingers curled around a warm cup, he showed me

a man alive back in Princeton, New Jersey.

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So yeah, this poem is an elegy of sorts for my grandfather who passed away on March 31st, 1997. This experience never happened (that I recall), but I think it does him justice. My poetry class seemed to like it well enough. Anyone notice the chiasmus?