Poetry, Mermaids, and Muses

So far in my self-imposed break/exile from poetry, I’ve been exposed to a number of notions; disjointed notions. It’s all about conversation. Intelligent voices speculating, whispering truths out of the side of their mouths.

Sometimes, my email muse shows me that self pity makes the horse blind to the edges of perception, responding to the bit tug of some driver with a whip who knows where he wants to go, and wants no distracting views of grass or motor cars to startle his transporter into a jump in a different direction.

It has to make sense, move forward on a street somewhere, the way a needle on a cork floating in water makes sense to a North pole traveler, but that’s magnetic, a pull that keeps us in line when we’re resting. Push on the cork and the needle bobs and splashes; North is an illusion of fixed position.

Monks float in a sort of brown way on the air like wisemen on parade; look at the way. I find myself holding my breath, hiding anger and angst. All is nothing. Illusions of perception. Monk-ey crap. They poop and pee, and they die as surely as Lincoln did.

The voices are sad children who have lost their mothers, beaten by their fathers. The only thing worse than sad fucking drunks full of unfocused anger are sad poets who no longer drink or smoke, fuck, or say anything they really mean because they don’t want to offend anyone and they sure as hell don’t want to die. They touch the hems of mystics hoping to be healed. In faith, they will be. With or without faith, no one lives here after death.

I hear voices telling stories to anyone who listens. I can’t help wondering who asked them because no one wants to hear the stories.

“I loved, and the one I loved wasn’t who I wanted to love,” the story mantra goes, “because they didn’t love me the way I wanted to be loved.”

Once upon a Sometimes, lovers leave; something in a mirror tugs at the empty spaces, mermaids of self seen in passers-by call us to swim with them for a while. How long can we pretend we don’t see their gills. Don’t expect a fisherman to help just because he knows how to set the hook.

Disjointed voices. I am not ready to leave my summer garden with its tomatoes, pumpkins, cucumbers, and corn just yet. My granddaughter likes to watch me water and weed, and we like to sing together. She likes (and I love) to listen to Grandma read stories, teach her about art, music, and how to stay out of the deep water that she is not ready to swim in just yet.

Creativity is a gathering of experience, piled high until it begins to look like something I’ve seen before; a few whacks and it’s even something I can show to friends and family. But, believe me, I’ve seen enough drowning people to learn to wear a lifejacket in deep waters because people get tired of saving us from mermaids and mermen. Drowning is no joke, but it’s always done alone, else it’s just bad swimming.

Stephen Morse

Editor

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