Dismantling A Mystery (or How Come It Doesn’t Rhyme?)...

the poem:



Seeing You For The First Time…

is like remembering
that with Indians, it is all one:
Velvet rain falling over lush Peace Hills back home -
Old man stone glowing in fire
at Beetle Omeasoo’s sweatlodge at Ermineskin -
Hundreds of black wings beating in the great nation that is the sky
each night high above Coastal Salish ground -
Or…your gentle voice heard in woods at Qu’appelle




photo of larry by j-ro
editing a friend's poetry manuscript and helping another with their work it occurred to me that this poem might shed some light on MY theory and process (in particular), it is simply the way i see and do it...proceed at your own interest...

poetry is NOT for everybuddy...one of my favorite crushes, one of the ten most beautiful people in the world informed me she wouldn't even finish reading one of my poems that she came across...this is not to focus on her (i mean it’s clear she loves my body…but i want her to love my mind - i’m an artist after all) but to indicate how adamant people can be or how adverse to verse some people are...but why should this be? - many theories out there but i tend to think the reasons are mainly these:

a) people tend to think of poetry ONLY as that Shakespearean sonnet they made you memorize while holding a gun to your head back in high school...it was traumatic, you know it was AND you never did figure out what the hell was meant before and after the words: tomorrow, tomorrow and tomorrow...

b) the only poetry you've read since high school was by that ditzy, hippy-chick or the whacked out dude so spaced on the chronic that you thought everything they said was poetry (cause you were a little whack-y AND ditzy yerself back then)...until much later you realized they were committing to paper every pointless, free associative, incoherent pile of syllabic word-turds you ever read but it also occurs to you much later how badly you wanted to get in their pants or how bad they wanted in yours, so much so that even the words "fuck off and die!" seemed to resonate with insight (at last - someone really gets me!), seemed razor-sharp with clarity of purpose and breadth of vision and…romance, even (whoah...think i love him/her).

So people have either read the most difficult and challenging poetry in the English language (the dreaded Elizabethan iambic pentameter) OR the shit that literally means nothing…at any rate had you the chance to read a cross selection of contemporary poetry (that is, poetry written in your time, which typically is free-verse or not in a specific structure on the page) there isn't a doubt in my mind that you would eventually find work by someone that does in fact speak to you, resonates with you and has you come to appreciate what can often be the profound power and beauty of language (more about this topic in future posts)...

for now, it would appear that i must be changing, growing or getting weak in the head because i'm doing something i NEVER do...which is – ANALYZE A POEM...of my own... this one called: Seeing You For The First Time...(located at the top of this post)

using the first line as the title is a device that goes back centuries...couldn't possibly remember where I first saw it, though i know Shakespeare did do this often with his numbered sonnets as did ee cummings, bill bissett, al purdy and many, many other poem-makers have also done this through the ages and i rather like to do this at times when the opening line results in a sense of intrigue or contemplation in the reader...i try to find (use/write) something specific but also it is working if there’s a chance the reader believes they could actually contribute the next line...admittedly, though, writing this first section of explanation reminds me that the first line of THIS particular poem became the title only AFTER most of the rest had been composed...so, the use of this device didn't become apparent to me to until later in the process but it's an example of what i call a happy accident...this might seem to imply that ALL or ANY poem or poetry could simply use as it's title the first line of the poem but this is not the case…

back to the poem…I’ll come clean, now…this one was inspired by (surprise, surprise)…a girl!...i had the opening line (which became the title)…then, very simply…I compared that meeting to 4 different and beautiful things:

1. rainfall
2. rocks in a fire
3. birds flying
4. the woman’s voice

...and that’s all there was to it...more or less...

seeing her for the first time WAS beautiful…the title/first line would be a cliché if the rest of the poem used typical language or imagery…it would not work if I simply said:

…seeing you is like rainfall, rocks in a fire, bird’s flying and your voice…


we learned in early grade school what the words “like” or “as” do to a sentence…it takes a phrase from being understood literally and then makes it a figure of speech (a metaphor)…so, seeing her wasn’t actually or in fact (literally) all those things, it was LIKE all those things, this idea goes a long, long way in language…if you say: seeing you IS nice…seeing you is good - these sentiments may be true but they are bland, mundane and hearing them a thousand times will mean much less the thousandth time you hear it…and haven’t we heard “nice” or “happy” used thousands of times by the time we become adults?...nice and good are for babies and puppies…

the craft of writing involves your choice of words and arrangement of them, the specifics that will spur the imagination of the reader - it's in the details...this is where it can be way, way overdone or one uses descriptions heard a million times (but you know what? people love that...ask Hallmark), OR the poem can become something fresh, not said in quite the same way before, evocative of so much OR it may simply sound lyrical to the point where speech and music seem to meld...ALL these things are possible at this stage if you care enough (or if you care little about what you make) - - in this poem, alongside the 4 items, i have also included four specific Indian PLACES; peace hills, ermineskin, coast salish ground and qu’appelle…NOT ALL readers will be aware of all the references but I’m betting the good reader will make those connections without having heard of one or all of the geographical places referred to in the piece…

i confess, i can’t say precisely what: with indians it is all one, means, but i don't need to…i did want to convey the idea that…indians…know…what do they know?...this question in my mind propels the poem, elevates it, transports the reader’s mind, implies so much, opens the piece so that any reader of any background will intuitively define this phrase for themselves…this, in my mind is where god came in, the synaptic exchange, the happy accident, where the rubber met the road, where the exposition became art…

It then occurred to me that indians are only here today BECAUSE WE REMEMBER, we exist the way we do because of the way we keep our histories’ alive…with our voices, through orality, through externalizing memory (in other words, talking - and now, through writing, even blogging, very subversive if you ask me, you may disagree but go ahead,…you’re allowed)…so it also felt intuitive to place the idea of memory or remembering SOMEWHERE in the piece…

This all could be summed up by saying: first seeing her reminded me of these beautiful things – but i wanted her to fall in love in with me, i wanted to inspire the reader to look at objects of their own desire in a way they never had before…it was and remains a tall order but it’s what you want to do every time out…you want to somehow change the universe for someone (sometimes it’s just yourself) with your ideas because it was done for you, to you by others before you and it’s a safe bet that these experiences/exchanges will continue long after my time…you want the words you choose to be vivid and strong and say a lot with a lot of power but often times it is (what you don’t say or) what you say by implication that has the most power.

SO…how much of this, in the end, applies to what i wrote that day?...all of it.

How much of this occurred to me WHILE i wrote it?...none of it.

it this i call…magic



© 2010 Champsteen Publishing

Ka'wahse (audio poem) feat. Duane Howard

Flute: Duane Howard

Ka'wahse*

wherever it is
i’ll more than likely see you there

i marvel at what is to be found at 2 am
(2:20, technically)

only in poems do dogs bite gently
and we call ourselves poets

sometimes I am taken by the thrill of recognition
of who we are (who the other is)
of what we do (have always done)
traveling light leaving nothing behind
packing up heavy sorrows for when they become useful
forced to understand, that at times,
we may make sense only to ourselves

there is nothing un-real
about an embrace on some half-remembered shore –
words spent high in mountaintops (which of course, you understand,
were once at the bottom of the sea?)

we dance our ridiculous lives beneath the pen
but eventually come clean,
admit these things matter
love things hard to hold onto –
people now distant as the moon, some only an arm’s length away

what will they understand of your footprints upon this ground? –
ashes that were once your bones –
your fingerprints upon their minds –
echoes of your voice in their dreams
when there was so much in the world to make us bleed

will everything you gave be enough?
the sad and beautiful part is that it will have to be

ours is to be transient and grounded at once
rooted in something no one can say

i say:
let those without black hair fret and strut
their final hour upon the stage, their idiot’s tale

which is simply another way to say:
i’m glad i was an indian

it is crucial to believe in things
like a good song,
time spent on that half-forgotten shore,
that somewhere,
we signified something

it is good knowing
that it is a cold distance
from here to the nearest star
but warm between this page
and where these words go


* (Mohawk word, meaning - Where are you going?)

© 2010 Champsteen Publishing

Faces (audio poem)

Duane Howard: Flute


FACES

a part of me died with him
a part of him lives with me
- Eduardo Galeano

Last night I saw you again, cousin, propped against the tree where I found you. Only this time, you weren’t holding a bottle. Instead, iced in your grip was a book. The one I always wanted you to read. I tried prying it from your hand but you wouldn’t let it go. When I woke up I smiled because it occurred to me that you never liked to read, saying life was too short for it. Then I got up and wrote about a storyteller.


-You can always tell when dogs have found someone and when coyotes have. Coyotes, you understand, are not like dogs. Out of fear, a dog will not eat from a discovered carcass for several days. But when he does, it is the stomach first - the delicate organs, I suppose. Next, the buttocks and thighs, then the calves and onward until finally, the gnawed remnants are discovered and eventually placed where they belong. No, they are not like dogs at all. Coyotes begin with the face and often it is all they eat. Maybe they think they can fool us and we won’t recognize the person we are looking for. When you are looking for someone who can’t be found, go out at night and listen. If you are patient you will hear them gather, those coyotes. Then you must go where the yips and barks are. When you get there, you must say nothing and move carefully until everything has been made proper. It’s like hunting.


Yes, we did these things together didn’t we, cousin? – Fracturing our delicate selves with the desperate company of strangers who did things dangerous and beautiful. Didn’t we quarrel and contend with the enemy, determined in the destruction of myth and making our own, sometimes actually making history? Didn’t we leave behind the cages, the scorched earth and fermented dreams, and a kind of slaughter every place we went?

We put you in the frozen ground and Joey cried, “I ain’t got a big brother no more!” I didn’t tell him he was wrong or right because I always doubt the things I’m sure of.

I left too, and went across the mountains. Now I live by the ocean, where the Indians are nice and care what people think of them. You don’t have to know anything out here, you need only appear to. You’d hate it, cousin. But, you’d be glad to know I still break the occasional glass and remain hell-bent on destroying notions. I write it down and read it for us and everyone at home and anybody else who cares to listen.

Tonight, I’ll take some of our favorite into the woods with me and spread a blanket out under a tree somewhere. Maybe I’ll hear coyotes. I’ll tilt my head back and listen for the rush of water and smoke a cigarette for you – that maybe, this is all there is…

this terminal condition.


© 2010 Champsteen Publishing

fuck (audio poem)

Fuck
(or What Happens When Too Much Blood Enters the Alcohol System)

nothing seems to kill me,
no matter how hard i try…

and once again,
all this time there has been winter in my blood

but fuck it!
what i mean to say is:

yeah, i know,
nobody asked me to suffer,
that was my idea
but you have to grant me
that there is something sadly magnificent
about missing people you love
that you never even met

me and all other majestic groove locaters
from villages near and far
have decided it’s last call
down the hatch and bottoms up
this last one’s on you
(and believe me, one way or another, you’ll pay)

i have attacked ships on fire off the shoulder of orion
and at times drank like a pirate
i have blessed virgins in my own way
saw fit to shed them of their baubles
and though i didn’t love `em all
i loved as many of `em as i could

just like ronnie said: be my little baby!

i love her…i just don’t need her

in every dive, flop-house,
gin mill, hootch parlor
and booze can this side of the west pecos
i have been known to experience
the odd momentary lapse
in both judgment and reason

but i too have been known to sit with coyote
and grandma,
we raise our glasses, toast each other
and discuss corporations and bodily functions

blues?
yeah, i got the blues
i got the tombstone blues
and i ain’t never been to no delta
but i know what it is to be chased
by those same insatiable hellhounds

split my head open eight more times
i don’t give a rat’s ass
8 concussions can’t compare to the hangover
of a pint
plus a flap
plus a 26
plus an double
plus an eight ball
plus a 40 pounder
plus blah, blah, blah
plus yadda, yadda, yadda…

i’m the answer with all the questions,
try me

alex, i’ll take who the fuck am I?...for the whole fucken works!

and fuck kerouac, i really am Standing-
On-The-Road,
believe it

(did I hear someone free-associating?)

and, by the way!
that fucken guy didn’t die for my sins
i’m doing that every single day of my life
you’re all just the same old preachers selling the devil,
yourselves and all those other lame concepts
like canada and manifest destiny
and still wrapping yourselves in the strong arms of the union

so i think i’ll hang on to this aching heart
while tasting the liquor on these lips



© 2010 Champsteen Publishing

Addictions Intro

* this and the next 3 posts, ending with Addictions Outro are parts of a presentation i gave at Nicola Valley Institute - the seminar consisted of video and lecture and utilizes this blog and poetry to illustrate what i term Creative Approaches To Counseling - it will remain up for another week or so and be removed in December...dig it while ya can...

All There Is...(audio poem)

All There Is…

is an old woman's voice
in a run-down little house on a piece of borrowed land
this side of the reserve
I remember the old woman in dark skin and white hair telling me – warning me:
a story told without love will not be remembered

like indians do,
I took you as my grandmother, never having met either of my own (or my mother)
and I took those words as commandments
or more accurately, I took stewardship of your words,
I protected them
like indians do

my damaged memory of your ghostly form
is framed by crumpled leaves and dense grasses
deadfall and marshy muskeg,
I am not painting a quaint, rustic, idyllic landscape
not singing to the “oneness” of anything
I am beyond remembering
and singing my own song

in a place where I saw bent women, berry-picking
and one with lips, stained red and succulent
I tried but found I could never taste that good to her
and on and on and on…

I carry my grief and gladness and never look back

in these places…I saw
in every village, every town, each weigh station
I have been a pilgrim, a merchant trading stories, hands and more

at calgary
at brindisi,
at neskonlith
at santorini
at peace hills
at oaxaca
at napean
at musqueam
at white bear
at oslo
at yellowknife
at oppenheimer park

unvarnished episodes, encounters, entanglements
recorded only in an island of lost memories that you may have
of her telling you: it’s alright…you’re okay,
and these things were so only because she said they were

she has pulled us through birth canals and rites of passage…the death of my brothers
because of men she wore outmoded black veils and still
set broken bones, nourished us with compassion
we were astonished, emboldened, fed and far better…soothed
when we felt as motherless children
when we felt at the brink of cavernous dark

from the margins they shape the world
through cultures melding and those long since vanished
there are still glimpses of something permanent, eternal

it is that I long for the comfort of her voice
snatch for it like a thief
guard it like final embers carried
across tundra by dried mud tribes of stone age

once,
there were long strands of hair, shiny and damp
that fell across her shoulders, beneath the sunlight…

these sapphire-tinted recollections (every last one)
are her words and are air and water and reflection

I am nothing, sometimes not even a man
just a word-finder, conjurer of everything you have already said,
without you I would have stayed nothing, dust or the thought of it
but now something is created across time and space
because she was here, existed

the first mother wears these lakes and rivers,
mountains, meadows, towns and cities
and I am given to worship of things I cannot explain –
condemn those foolish enough to live without magic –

she teaches me to understand
that every woman is someone’s daughter on this perilous journey
that life beyond every kind of poverty is better
and though yet hungry for that great wisdom and power
I am still ashamed (though still alive),
still asking the same foolish questions as in ages past

but for you I am contented with love…every kind of love
and I now know where all words come from
with me it is sacred faith that there is grace among storm
and on certain miracle nights, sometimes, I almost feel…beloved

the great wisdom of her collective ages:
that love does not conquer
but it can survive…

it has at least that much power


© 2010 Champsteen Publishing

Honour Song (poem)...

Peace, my friend,
peace

there is no darkness, only not knowing

so pray…and believe

and I think I can see you –
I can see those brown eyes half on their way to heaven
I look with sight more honest
than my eyes deliver
I listen to you, to your songs
(some unchanged in a thousand years)
with something more true
than my ears can hear
Walk with me awhile
with something more real
than the touch of my hand upon your shoulder

Here, together
there is no more turning away
there is no more tearing ourselves in two
If there is any comfort here for you
know that I too am sick with my experience
I marvel at the strange rivers we have crossed
rivers on whose far banks lie forests
where men, women and children are lost
we seek shelter
and someone with that look in their eye
though our hearts may have grown weary
and just a little shy

In another life
I may have brought bridled horses and game –
for you, for your family
and spoken of good things between us and Nations
For a night or two
I might have stayed outside your lodges
with those horses, and waited
sleeping only after you and yours had done so first
perhaps I carried a powerful bundle or shield –
carried them for everyone

Yet today,
we are here, together
Though there may still be an aching sadness –
for those ones crossed over –
they are not gone – they do not sleep
but have awakened from the dream of life
(as spirits live forever)
It is we who stumble
through these stormy visions
chasing phantoms and madness
Must we still decay and wither
and fall each day with our fear, shame and grief? –
our days before this
little more than cold hopes?

Then pray…and believe

The Oldest One remains
Many will change and pass
but there is a light that forever shines
and while Earth’s shadows fly
our hearts will be opened wide

And when I fall –
when I am caught down deep, beyond all reach
I will keep you safe with me, like a warm wind
like a sweet waterfall

When I close my eyes I see you –
you are walking on a bridge
glancing over the mysterious water
there is still a trace of fear
but I can also see that you know
there is something better
yes, you know there are things better
than to live in dark water

And after all this,
when some gentle night descends
when there is, at last, stillness
when you are no longer alone at sea
but close to my heart
I will look to the West
to see a great and glorious red sky – an eternal sky

I will whisper things sacred
like…hear me
like…remember
like…your name,
and I will wonder
if you too can see that same red sky

addictions outro

Big Brown Beautiful Bannock-Stuffed Indians (audio poem)

Big Brown Beautiful Bannock-stuffed Indians…

are puttin’ on their bingo shirts
and headed down to the hall early for the good seats
grab seven chicken and spud meals to go –
alright, gimme 20 dollars worth and a Bonanza!

darkened and bulging eating muscles
just a goin’ to beat ol’ sixty
with a smoldering pihtwanis* dangling here
and a Pepsi making the rounds there –
I can’t get lucky, I was born lucky!

Big brown beautiful bannock-stuffed Indians
are dancing all night in great circles
ribbon shirts and wranglers
and numberless children all doing the indigenous shuffle –
hey, anybody see where my kids went?

bannock-slapped and neck-boned to the brim
with room only for tea…and the next meal
food always tastes better when it’s free
besides, who needs money on a good rez anyway? –
ho-la, there’s a lot of neechees here tonight!

Big brown beautiful bannock-stuffed Indians
are trying to win and round-dance in the cities
tradition is taking its own sweet time
but it’s coming…and everybody knows everybody –
Dear Uncle, it’s just like you said it would be…

home-fed scouts and wide-eyed warriors
are in every place you care to look
pounding on pavement, doors and drums
and recreating ourselves constantly –
I am home, I am home, I am home



* pihtwanis – Cree word for “cigarette”


© 2010 Champsteen Publishing