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Category: my poems
June 27, 2019
grammmar in action, verb moods
“Philosophy and Grammar“
Gentile da Fabriano
__________
reach, imperative, I always say, indicative,
for a star, you might, conditional, get the
moon, but you might also, conditional,
get a star
such is the power of mood in verb
structure, and an expression of how
words through grammatical stipulations
become inspiration, poetry
think about it
R ! chard
June 20, 2019
on ego, in particular, mine
“Luncheon in the Studio“ (1868)
Édouard Manet
_________
you think I’ve got a big ego, I asked
a friend who’d just told me I had one,
not confrontationally but as a matter
of fact, I wasn’t offended, just curious,
I think I’m so humble, I answered,
usually, so deferential
she wouldn’t cede to my, to her,
manifestly improbable, argument
what do you call ego, I asked
what the definition is in the dictionary,
she answered, and pulled out her cell
phone to prove it
sure, I said, I know what the dictionary
says, but how does that apply to me
well, just what it says, she said
my mother reads in the paper that it’s
going to rain today, I said, then it
doesn’t, and I retort that only the
weather essentially knows about the
weather, but she still keeps to the
prognostications
one night I said, look, mom, the moon
is full, no, she answered, it’s a quarter
moon, it said so on the calendar, look,
I said again, it’s full, it’s a full moon,
but she wouldn’t believe me, it turned
out she’d been reading the previous
year’s almanac
print gives us Platonic ideals, standards
that we think definitive, I asserted, but
everything is in the eye of the beholder,
words are just approximations, nothing
but meeting places where we toss around
disparate ideas no firmer, nor distinct,
nor assured than conversations among
different languages, miscommunication
can be that wide
my friend tells me just talking like that
is proof of my big ego, but I still don’t
get it, I think I’m so courteous,
fundamentally, so congenial and, you
know, nice, otherwise
R ! chard
February 9, 2019
“a simple story” – R ! chard
“The Book of Time“ (2014)
Nina Tokhtaman Valetova
______________
ferreting through old papers the other
night, I found, in a forgotten corner of
my closet, this poem, I thought it had
some merit
_________
a simple story,
mine.
Like yours,
it has its moments
— passion,
pain,
to each in similar proportions
(I’ve also had a broken heart,
and you are happy too, sometimes) —
moments telling tales, a lot, for me
of this
or that
— and every tale is true, in time,
of everyone —
moments that pass,
one,
and then the next,
just gone,
like that,
and apart from what is here,
right here — this black and white —
this thirtieth day in May,
nineteen seventy-nine,
its 13:48,
then 49,
are gone,
just gone,
like that !
R ! chard
March 11, 2018
on, however exuberant, ambition
“The Chess Players“ (1902)
_______
for Joselyn, my Ariel
pumped as I was by my most recent
exegesis about longevity, a dear,
dear friend, used to, and infinitely
tolerant, of my, apparently often,
according to her, exhortations
about my significant literary abilities,
sighed when I told her I’d make her
famous with my art, also my mother,
as well as other influential and
cherished characters, and produced
a Scrabble word over our game to,
in an instant, overwhelm me with a
seven letter concoction, at the very
last moment, leaving me with a row,
furthermore, of unused tiles, with,
however trivial, still annihilating,
consequences
ouch, I said, girlfriend
but I’m not giving up on my promise
to her, I’m reaching for the stars
what do you think
R ! chard
March 11, 2018
the time change / March 11, 2018
“Clock with Blue Wing“ (1949)
________
with the unruly sleeping patterns of the aged,
mostly, disquieting midnight hours awake,
fretting ever about not enough proper rest,
even though the next day might be fraught,
in retirement, with plenty of time to recover,
I wondered, as such a person, at the
relevance of this semiannual time change,
especially among seniors, those dripping in
time to squander, one day following the next,
often nearly indistinguishably
all it means to me, I said to my mom, is that
I’ll be falling asleep, instead of at two, at three,
in the morning
she hasn’t answered yet
R ! chard
September 19, 2017
on Billy Collins – “Safe Travels”
me, May 24, 2016
__________
I save all the New Yorker poems
to read after I’ve been through
everything else in the issue,
like dessert after a meal, icing
on the cake, sometimes too
heavy, sometimes too light,
sometimes too rich, sometimes
just right
today, I found my favourite poem,
period, this year, stepped right
into its shoes, like old slippers,
the only difference being my
walls are painted a variety of
contrasting colours, studded
with memorabilia, treasured
artefacts, see above
also, no one’s translating my
poems, though even our metre
is the same, try it, sing us out
loud, you’ll dance
R ! chard
_____________
Every time Gulliver travels
into another chapter of “Gulliver’s Travels”
I marvel at how well travelled he is
despite his incurable gullibility.
I don’t enjoy travelling anymore
because, for instance,
I still don’t know the difference
between a “bloke” and a “chap.”
And I’m embarrassed
whenever I have to hold out a palm
of loose coins to a cashier
as if I were feeding a pigeon in a park.
Like Proust, I see only trouble
in store if I leave my room,
which is not lined with cork,
only sheets of wallpaper
featuring orange flowers
and little green vines.
Of course, anytime I want
I can travel in my imagination
but only as far as Toronto,
where some graduate students
with goatees and snoods
are translating my poems into Canadian.
__________
psst: I said just recently to a poet
acquaintance that what poetry
needed in the 21st Century is
humour, the only art form not
catching up with the rest,
otherwise it’ll die of, indeed
succumb to, its own
lugubriousness
thank you again, Billy Collins
September 7, 2017
a contemporary haiku, on wine
________
a glass of wine, I sing,
two, in German,
go figure
R ! chard
December 24, 2016
true love – an insight
“Love’s Secrets“ (1896)
_________
the only way you can hate someone
you’ve loved is if your love was selfish,
true love can never not love, ever
Richard
October 7, 2016
what is a poet
“Flowers In a Brown Vase“ (1904)
_______
if I imagine myself to be a poet, what
is a poet, I have to ask, or, more
accurately, what do I imagine a poet
to be
cause this is a two-way street, I am
defined by the word I inhabit, but I
define the word as well, redefining
it, essentially, to fit my etymological
purpose
my moral purpose I leave to myself,
in a completely other ideological
dimension
if I can
a poet then is one who writes, paints,
composes, manifests, in a word,
creates, poems
what is a poem
a poem is where beauty and truth
combine to create harmony,
coalescence, to the point of one’s
admiration, enchantment, wonder,
enlightenment, in incremental steps
leading to very transcendence, the
feeling that something has moved
in your heart
just a bouquet of flowers will do it,
for instance
that’s what I think
Richard
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