Solo (earlier version)

I am only an ocean .
Do not blame me
if I swallow you up .
I am pulled to you
by the same moon
that pulls you
to me .

And we heard she was such a strong woman ,
such a steady, level-headed girl .

I am only a desert .
Don’t curse me
if you lose yourself
in me .
I am burned by the same sun
that burns within you .

Such a good girl ,
never talked back to her mother .

I am only the sky .
How could I be
too blue for you ?
Don’t your reflecting eyes
make me what I am ?

Does anyone know what happened ?
How did she get like this ?

I am only alive .
Aren’t you ?

No ! No ! No !


compare Newer Version

chaotic discipline

I do not believe
in spanking children
that is why
when I’m attending
a performance
and that bad girl inside me
starts whining over trivialities
I just hand her a pen
a piece of scrap paper
and tell her to just write down
whatever is bothering her

Mostly this works well

Sometimes she starts writing
notes to her co-attendees
but often you can see her
sitting quietly in the first row
furiously scribbling to herself

A lot of what she writes about
pertains in an acerbic way
to the goings-on on-stage
but sometimes she starts
dragging the most amazing stuff
up out of the bottom of my brain
putting it down on paper
for everyone to see

She calls this stuff poetry

when she gets home
she types it up
starts reading it aloud
sending copies off
to would-be publishers

I don't know what to do

fairsCaPe in motion

Go to 3:45 of this video to see Jean and others dancing and playing with streamers while Ian Wilder performs "Threads" with Nylon & Steel. In 1997. Probably at the Unitarian Fellowship in Bayshore.

Reading of fairsCaPe's poetry

By now you should all have your 2008 calendars. Turn to September and write in this event
in Northport, Long Island, NY on Friday the 26th.

The Total Child

(playing with "magnetic poetry")

as music told me I came upon red hot winter squirreling
                                            no green flowers
that is dad’s coolest balloon bubble glowing inside of the
                                                   sad night
the crying live baby dinosaur was spring toy box summer day
                                                      yellow
clouded wet woman magic tells of my smartly down-turned
                                                sister’s sky
her one friend gets it in where faster mud flew with silly
                                                        rain
see on a joy nest owl song who’s stopping is a born snow lake
                                                       child
are they like man tree and are my cocoons fed funny blue grow
                                                       water
butterfly cried talk together whisper like a hearty gardener
imagine sun hat flew up home to aten, a far door bounce
I pull and jump and twirl and follow the little hand
his fed fat cat went peace happy or has she
an apple walked slow time for farm wing fly that went round
                                                        bed
she dogs get told to say I am cow castle dream
for if it is so big ate the fun had girl by play barn he
                                               started good
               love I have been silent color ran turtle
gladly pink mom frog star ball put dark light out
she saw pig eat for moon boy once he was top of dug
                                                   y were y
you went “ask ‘yes?’ and go in”                                 
                                                   y are ly
                                        end          
                                                  y were ly

poem in a datebook (apparent first draft)

I guess now
I should be writing
grandmotherly poems
about
bright rainbows
sweet cream lullabies

soft rhymy poems
to lull babies to sleep

sing singy poems
about nothing more deep
than an ocean
so blues as to match
babies' eyes

about flowers
full meadows
pillow soft as a sigh

Two minds with one old plan

The poet said
"pale and wan,
here it is,
two thousand and seven."
The poet sits
at a baseball game
with no change of clothes.

Today, May 21, 2007,
one hundred years
he and I recline here.
One group after after another.
Please help me to understand this--
my relationship with this tree.
My plan is to write.

Which nineteenth century poet died
of cervical cancer?

'pale and wan':
Where is she now?
my hands ...
Where was I then?
We only glanced--
struck by beauty
not pulled by its
coursing desire.
How not in our time,,,
How a time is authored
in a moment
in a hug
in a wheelchair.

The times change little;
Medications change little;
Pain is the same.

written for
 her memory
Knowing she would
 need it now
Knowing and worried
 about them