A Pair of Back-to-School Poems

FELIX CROW
by Kay Ryan

Crow school

is basic and

short as a rule—

just the rudiments

of quid pro crow

for most students.

Then each lives out

his unenlightened

span, adding his

bit of blight

to the collected

history of pushing out

the sweeter species;

briefly swaggering the

swagger of his

aggravating ancestors

down my street.

And every time

I like him

when we meet.

(The Best of It, Grove: New York, 2010, p. 225)

TO SCHOOL!

by Stevie Smith

Let all the little poets be gathered together in classes

And let prizes be given to them by the Prize Asses

And let them be sure to call all the little poets young

And worse follow what's bad begun

But do not expect the Muse to attend this school

Why look already how far off she has flown, she is no fool.

(Collected Poems, New Directions: New York, 1983, p. 269)

Missed Kay Ryan

I was going to hear Kay Ryan at the MFA last night.  But the heavy, cold rain held me back; I just wanted to go home and get in bed with the cats.  Here is a poem of hers based on a museum experience.

Outsider Art
by Kay Ryan

Most of it’s too dreary
or too cherry red
If it’s a chair, it’s
covered with things
the savior said
or should have said—
dense admonishments
in nail polish
too small to be read.
If it’s a picture,
the frame is either
burnt matches glued together
or a regular frame painted over
to extend the picture. There never
seems to be a surface equal
to the needs of these people.
Their purpose wraps
around the backs of things
and under arms;
they gouge and hatch
and glue on charms
till likable materials—
apple crates and canning funnels—
lose their rural ease. We are not
pleased the way we thought
we would be pleased.

Two Birds with One Stone

It's the last day of National Poetry Month and the day after William & Kate's wedding.  So here is a poem by Stevie Smith in the nick of time.

The Hat*
I love my beautiful hat more than anything
And through my beautiful hat I see a wedding ring
The King will marry me and make me his own before all
And when I am married I shall wear my hat and walk on the palace wall. 

 *Stevie Smith, The Collected Poems, New York: New Directions Books, 1983, page 272.

Finally ! Color-Coded Rhyme

As my regular readers may recall, rhyme has been a carrier of Truth to me since childhood.  So I love poetry that uses lots of rhyme and slant rhyme.  Currently I am reading Kay Ryan's latest: The Best of It.  Here are a couple of rhyme-bunctious poems from the book with the rhymes and slant rhymes, same sounds and similar sounds linked using my own color-coding system (patent pending).

GRAZING HORSES (page 166)

Sometimes the

green pasture

of the mind

tilts abruptly.

The grazing horses

struggle crazily

for purchase

on the frictionless

nearly verticle

surface.  Their

furniture-fine

legs buckle

on the incline,

unhorsed by slant

they weren't

designed to climb

and can't.


CHART (page 254)
There is a big
figure, your age,
crawling, then
standing, now
beginning to bend
as he crosses
the stage.  Or
she.  A blurred
and generalized
projection of you
and me.  For a
long time it seems
as remote
from the self
as the ape chart
where they rise up
and walk into man.
And then it seems
the realer part.

A Pair of Horns.

Pussycat sits on a chair

Implacably with acid stare.

Those who early loved in vain

Use the cat to try again,

And test their bruised omnipotence

Against the cat's austere defense.

__________________________

In the tub we soap our skin

And drowse and meditate within.

The mirror clouds, the vapors rise,

We view our toes with sad surprise:

The toes that mother kissed and counted,

The since neglected and unwanted.

Both these poems are from Poems in Places by Edward Newman Horn, New York: Zebulin Pr., 1963.  The second one reminds me that my yoga instructor wants us (her pupils) to work on moving each little toe independently from the others.  This is hard.  Each set of four little toes move like a harnessed team of horses.  When will they go wildly in different directions?  

The first poem does seem a bit cynical regarding cat ownership.  But I liked it, and it gave me an excuse to use cat clip-art.

A Poem for Spring

The Dandelion
by Vachel Lindsay (1879-1931)

O dandelion, rich and haughty,
King of village flowers!
Each day is coronation time,
You have no humble hours.
I like to see you bring a troop
to beat the blue-grass spears,
To scorn the lawn-mower that would be
Like fate's triumphant shears,
Your yellow heads are cut away,
It seems your reign is o'er.
By noon you raise a sea of stars
More golden than before.

Oh, Canada.

Since today is Thanksgiving in Canada, I'd like to honor George Johnston, a Canadian poet I love. If he's still alive, he's about 96. Following are a couple of my favorites:

NOCTAMBULE
Mr. Murple's got a dog that's long
And underslung and sort of pointed wrong;
When daylight fades and evening lights come out
He takes him round the neighbor lawns about
To ease himself and leak against the trees,
The which he does in drops and by degrees
Leaving his hoarded fluid only where
Three-legged ceremonious hairy care
Has been before and made a solemn sign.
Mythology, inscrutable, canine,
Makes his noctambulation eloquent
And gives a power of meaning to his scent
That all who come and sniff and add thereto
And scratch the turf, may know they have to do
With Mr. Murple's underslung long dog,
His mark, his manifesto and his log.


EATING FISH
Here is how I eat a fish
--Boiled, baked or fried--
Separate him in the dish,
Put his bones aside.

Lemon juice and chive enough
Just to give him grace,
Make of his peculiar stuff
My peculiar race.

Through the Travelers' Hotel
From the sizzling pan
Comes the ancient fishy smell
Permeating man.

May he be a cannier chap
Altered into me,
Eye the squirming hook, and trap,
Choose the squirming sea.