From Zeb’s head: Poetry by Numbers
I’ve been tossing this idea around in my head for awhile now… a melding of process and formula that can spark good poem after good poem, depending on the astuteness of the writer. There’s always blocks, but here’s a good way to get the ball rolling on a poem, after which you just describe the ball’s progress down the hill, then edit it together like a 20 second commercial for Froot Loops, with just the important stuff kept. Corn syrup and sugar. Very different. Anyway, here’s one way to write a poem without even trying:
Find an image, better yet, find two images. Any two images. For the purpose of this post let’s say a Hershey’s Kiss wrapper, and a small stain on the carpet shaped like Mickey Mouse.
Find a way that the two images are linked. With the Kiss wrapper and Mouse stain, they’re the aftermath of something. A wrapper and spilled glass of wine. Or it could be an imaginary connection, like the time you went to Disneyland and on the way you ate so many Hershey’s kisses that you threw up on the teacups, and they had to bring out the elementary school sawdust before they swept it up with a dustpan, shutting down the ride for 20 minutes. I can just see the little kids holding onto the fence bars like they were in prison, waiting, worried the ride might never be fixed, and their perfect day at Disneyland ruined. Not that that ever happened, but why write about what actually happens?
Now that you have that connection, find a third image that falls in line with the connection between the first two. For the case of the wrapper and the mickey ears reminding the narrator of a Disneyland trip, let’s add in one of those huge circle lollipops in rainbow colors.
Now that you have three solid images (and find a way to phrase your images interestingly… off the top of my head, maybe “the futuristic robe of a Hershey’s Kiss” or something) Think of the connotations of those images. With the candy wrapper, the stain and the lollipop, they’re pretty light images, I could go with that, or they could be deceivingly happy images. Sometimes you don’t want to go with the easy choice, find a way to make them seem a little darker, or perhaps ironic. But with three linked images, you can easily format some story around them, and then the fun game of exclusion comes in and you decide the most important elements for what you want the impact to be, sad, happy, excited, enthralled, though hopefully not bored or angry at poetry.
But once you have the narrative (or points, or whatever you have decided the poem will actually ’say’ or ‘really be about’ you can write the poem you’ve outlined and labeled. Sweet, huh?
I’m writing said poem, and will post it after the link, the first draft from the images I picked while writing this article. It’s 10:39, promise I’ll post by 11.
Sangria
The futuristic robe of a Hershey’s Kiss
lies on the carpet next to the Mickey Mouse
sangria stain Maria hadn’t mentioned,
wine glasses tipped off the coffee table
by a kick that would’ve made Pele proud.
She fed me the Kiss, sealed with a kiss
that lingered long enough to melt
the breast-shaped chocolate on my tongue
just a little, edges softened by held saliva,
and I didn’t open my eyes to my wife,
but felt her kiss travel to fingertips
and we actually believed our earlier declarations
of “fuck our problems,” and the traveling kiss
chased any angst away like Ms. Pacman
after blinking blue ghosts now her prey.
Later, robed in stretched wife-beater,
lying in bed, arm tingling behind Maria’s neck,
I thought about the last time I’d eaten a Kiss,
on the way to Disneyland when I was ten.
I ate the whole bag, so excited, crumpled
the foil into a single ball, kept it in my pocket.
On the teacups just after Alice in Wonderland,
that metal saucer spinning opposite the world
over my knees, chocolate erupted
from my lips without warning, drenching
my cup-mate, a little blonde-turned-brunette.
The Kisses mixed freely with waffles from IHOP,
a little chicken from the night before
textured the rest. The ride hummed to a stop,
a ‘cast member’ led a chain across the open gate,
the ride operator called a slouching man
in a khaki uniform to sawdust the mess,
sweep it into a dustpan. It looked like diarrhea
and I don’t think anyone bothered to tell him
which end it was ejected from. His arms straight,
breathing through his mouth. My parents
apologizing profusely to no one in particular,
mostly to other parents hovering over children
hanging onto fence posts, heads poked as far
through the prison bars as they’d go, scared
that the ride might never run again,
that they’d missed their chance at happiness.
Mom insisted lunch, laughed a little. Dad
rushed us through pizza in the shadow of Space
Mountain. “We’re getting what we paid for,”
he said. Gave me two Tums and we queued up.
The next day of the trip was waylaid by derailment
resulting in death. But Dad had already bought 3-day
tickets. We went back the next day, and I watched
every wheel on every cart before I left the line.
Maria rolled onto her side, freeing tingly arm.
I remembered the souvenir I’d chosen that third night,
the big prismatic lollipop of lines chasing one another
around and back from edge to center. So impractical,
it’s charm. I opened it in the car, licked it twice.
Tasted like plastic. When I stepped from the car,
the wooden dolly turned stick slipped my sleepy fingers
and the rainbow shattered at my feet.
I love my wife, I remember, looking at the stain
we’d made in the carpet in our limb flailing frenzy.
I slide the coffee table so that it covers the splotch
of red we’d painted inadvertently with our love.
Make sure the keepsake has a chance to set in deep.
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See? It’s pretty easy with the simple process. Let your mind make its own leaps and filter those into your words. This is obviously a quick first draft, but you get the idea right? For a 20 minute exercise I don’t think that was too bad…