BGeneric

Through The Glass Darkly

This poem is not about you
This poem is about running on the beach
Splashing in the surf, and kicking up sand
The wind is blowing and it is just about to rain
Laughing and breathing harder then it ever thought it could
This poem is not about you
This poem is about smiling for no reason
This poem is singing at the top its lungs
This poem does not care about rejection
This poem threw out all its regrets like an abandoned toothbrush
This poem is not about who was right and who was wrong
Because
This poem is not about you
This poem is running into the future, arms pumping, lungs exploding
Mind blowing euphoria
This poem has it’s head is in the clouds
This poem is throwing shells as far into the sea as it can
This poem is watching the sun set and the surf roll in
This poem doesn’t care if you please read and tell it what you think
Because
What the fuck do you know about poetry anyway?
This poem is not about you
This poem is not about loss and failure
This poem is not stopping at set backs and closed doors
This poem is not waiting for a text
This poem cut all its hair off and doesn’t care if anyone likes it
This poem does not even want to rhyme
This poem is watching the stars come out like spinning and swirling diamonds
This poem is letting the past melt away
This poems cup is running over with joy beyond understanding
This poem is about that high you feel when time stops and you stop trying to get ahead
So
you won’t get it
Because
This poem is not about you
This poem is not running away This poem is running into the future
Not looking back
No regrets
And
No hoped for, never made promises
Because
This poem is not about you
This poem is not about fear and self loathing
This poem is not asking your permission
This poem is doesn’t care about your opinion
This poem is sticking its head out the window on the way home
This poem refuses to be silent
This poem is getting carried away
This poem is howling at the moon
This poem is not about you
This poem is not about you
This poem is not about you
This poem is not about you

The apology was left in messages as unsent draft
I just wanted to say hi
Thinking of you, but then apon remembering everything that went wrong, and everything that could never have gone right
All the reasons everything went wrong
Maybe it’s just better unsaid
Especially since nothing has changed for the better, and you are probably living happily ever after
That is what other people do right?
Go to school
Get a job
Get married
Live happily ever after
Go on vacations
All that stuff that never happened to me
Because I did all the things I do
So maybe this apology is just one more bad idea
One more example of poor impulse control
I’d mess it up anyway

It’s too late for my poor husbands, but let me spare you some of their grief, because in their search for that elusive metaphor, poets can be somewhat “eccentric.”

  1. If you date a poet, everyone will think you are the person they are writing about.
  2. You will be the person they are writing about. (unless you are not)
  3. There will be drama.
  4. There will be tea.
  5. There will probably be alcohol.
  6. There definitely will be coffee.
  7. They have deep conversations about Animals, Clouds, and Grecian Urns.
  8. There will be poetry hands.
  9. There will be bongos.
  10. There will be open mics.
  11. There will be books.
  12. There will be so many notebooks and sketch pads, some with only a few pages used then lost, then desperately searched for, then forgotten.
  13. There will be poetic license.
  14. There will be melancholy.
  15. There will be Christmas lights all year.
  16. There will be sage.
  17. They collect metaphors like they are more valuable than faberge eggs, because they are.
  18. They think children’s books are sublime, because they are unforgettable.
  19. They position their furniture around windows, for them to stare out of for hours at a time.
  20. Your parents will think they are possessed.
  21. They are possessed.
  22. You will lose all arguments, because you just will.
  23. They will secretly judge your grammar.
  24. They carry notebooks and books everywhere.
  25. They hoard pens.
  26. The library is their fortress of solitude.
  27. They are obsessed with incredibly depressing films and music.
  28. They listen to every single kind of music you can imagine, even Brazilian monkey howling.
  29. They keep conversations going way too long.
  30. Their secrets will come out in poetry.
  31. It takes forever for them to have an opinion, because they can see everyone’s side.
  32. They speak in rhyme all the time.
  33. They talk to everyone, which means going anywhere, including the grocery store, takes forever.
  34. They concede fox news makes great cases for hating absolutely everyone, but maybe that should not be the goal.
  35. They do not understand the attraction of mobs.
  36. They do not understand the global threat of Dandelions and why they must be eradicated with toxic chemicals.
  37. They believe the toilet paper roll should roll out towards the back, so cats can not unroll them.
  38. They wear flip flops in the rain, because it’s the best!
  39. They think espresso machines and tiny cups are magic, because they are.
  40. There will be cats.
  41. There will be road trips.
  42. There will be prancercise.
  43. They have their own spirit animal.
  44. They have their own nemesis.
  45. They speak sparrow.
  46. There will be hats.
  47. There will be watches.
  48. There will be full engagement in the here and now.
  49. They search for truth like it is the only real magic in the world, because it is.
  50.  And they have ghosts only poetry can save them from.

There will good and bad and everything there will be. That is what it is. So you have been warned!

She lined her windows with cobalt glasses, wine bottles and sometimes even glass birds. She was the the only poet I had ever known, so part of me thought this was how it had to be done, until of course she started getting cats, and they disagreed. They were right of course. That is also when I knew, poets need cats, not blue glass.

It’s not what you think

or maybe it is, if you are thinking that tomorrow will come even if you are not there to see

did you know birds can sleep while flying over the sea for months at a time

that makes sense

because I have been sleepwalking through my life for years

I partly wish I had kept a diary during for 2020, but I didn’t. So that is that. I am partly glad I didn’t write about it. It was an angry year and I was just as angry as everyone else. I would kind of like to forget that part. I got sucked into the rhetoric and fear and the lethargy of that lost year as much as anyone. Any journaling I would have done would have turned into me grumbling about everything everyone else was grumbling about, and there was already too much of that out there. There were points in the year when it really felt like this could be it for us, the end of humanity. We couldn’t even be bothered to wear a mask for 10 minutes in a store to protect our fellow man from contracting a deadly disease. I really shouldn’t be talking about it like it is over. The issues of 2020 are not over. The vaccines have just begun to be administered. How many of us will get them? And honestly the pandemic was just the tip of the iceberg. The rhetoric and hate that had, if we are honest, always been here, and we still do. So, rest in peace 2020. It was not your fault.