ars poetica (with a small p)

(reposted from Tuesday, February 15, 2011)

A poem should not mean / But be.
          - Archibald Macleish

Outside, the snowflakes dance a minuet.
Wait a minute.
Do I need outside?
Isn't it implicit?
Outside, the snowflakes.
Inside, a minuet.
The snowflakes minuet.
No! No! Too telegraphic!
Try this.
The waves lap the shoreline.
The shoreline?
How about the shore?
The cat lapping the milk.
A minuet of cats.
And the paperboy?
He too could be pelted with snow.
On the beach?
Yes, on the beach.
In the middle of winter?
Why not?
What about the middle of summer?
What about it?
An evening of minuets.
Outside?
Yes.
Under the stars?
Of course.
The empty parking lot filling with snow.
Tracks.
In the snow?
From the dancers?
Dancing a minuet?
Yes.
Outside?
Yes, outside.
Under the stars?
Maybe.
Implied?
Possibly.
Possibly?
Possibly.
The newspaper is snow-soggy.
I'll speak to the paperboy tomorrow.
Outside?
Wherever.
Whatever.
In the middle of a minuet, if need be.
A paperboy dancing the minuet?
Why not?
As one of the snowflakes?
Yes, as one of the snowflakes.
Wouldn't his legs get cold?
Perhaps.
Are they made of paper?
Of course not.
They're made of snow.
He's one of the dancers.
Of the minuet?
Of the minuet.
The dancers have spent weeks rehearsing.
The minuet?
Yes, the minuet.
And now it's snowing?
Yes, and they're dancing.
The minuet?
Yes, the minuet.
I can see it.
Yes, it'll work.
Outside?
Yes, outside.
Outside, the snowflakes dance a minuet.

Excited that two of my "woman" poems (below) have been selected by Upstate Artist Guild artists as prompts for paintings to be included in exhibitions at Troy's Fish Market Gallery in November & Albany's Food Co-op in December.

Woman XVII

She enters my dream

through a side door

a blues harp player

in snakeskin boots

and weathered jeans.

Getting out of bed

I slip on a musical note.

Woman XXXIX

She says she wants to ride

and pulls up on her Harley.

I roll my Schwinn

back into the garage.

Screen Dump 724

With irrevocability looming, how can you be sure? . . .

Unlocking the tee-time,

OK, I get it,

but let's face it, it's nothing,

days pummeled with coffee and Danish . . .

No one in the know . . .

No other way . . .

The joint had to have been bugged, yes? . . .

Subjects flashing tenure, mashed with newsprint . . .

Opening statements . . . gappy, medieval references . . .

The room in stitches . . .

Talking heads . . . He walked! . . .

despite the fact they had chauffeured the 12 angry men

in an unmarked vehicle, windows blackened . . .

Yup, closed-mouthed

for the rest of the show, they were . . .

It was positively 4th Street, or maybe 5th, I forget . . .

Antonio Palmerini

Screen Dump 723

Your past lives gather in a room filled with familiars . . .

You're dumbfounded . . . speechless . . .

standing outside in knee-high grass . . . green and metronomic . . .

An upright bass player on loan from the produce section

of the food co-op runs changes over the retractions

you're riffing . . . prompting you to peel a dead language

from the interim speaker of the House of Crazy

who casts his die midstream and arrives at a reception

where the scene unfolds with blank stares . . .

Your mother's eyes redact the script . . .

A director calls for softer thought bubbles . . .

The move trips a flushed response hurling the entire cast

into the bowels of a banned book . . .

You want this hot early fall day to be enough but it is not . . .

Antonio Palmerini