Poetry Friday: Overheard

For our first poetry challenge of 2022, we composed "overheard" poems---which, as the name suggests, are created from borrowed material. They are similar to found poems-- but made from oral snippets instead of written ones.  The inspiration came from Susan Thomsen's blog. 

The challenge was clear enough---but when I went looking for material to borrow, I found that overhearing things was not easy in this muffled age of masks and social distancing. And the more I tried to listen in, the more dejected I felt. 

Phooey. 

I missed the easy give and flow of public, un-orchestrated conversation.

I missed conferences, workshops, Kidlit drink nights, retreats.

I  missed these lovelies, pictured below. 

So I wrote about that.  Only one word of this was overheard.  I'll tell you which one at the end.

  

Some of the Poetry Sisters
(August, 2010)

Fantasy

I stand, neck-deep

in the rollicking stream 

of an overbooked hotel lobby

bar, my thighs braced,

minnows of gossip 

flicking my hair. 

I order a bottomless

glass of well-water, clear

as rain on the plain; toast

the flash of the bartender’s 

gold tooth as she catches

my words, first try.

I laugh as three fevered 

discussions stalk

the room like rare griffins,

battering dusty tropes

with their ropy tails

and cavernous beaks.

Our voices pollinate

the air, float 

into anyone’s ears; 

maybe we shout

as the elevator opens

like a levy, spilling

poets into the room:

HEY, old friend!

Afterwards,

I tell the doctor what 

was wrong: I needed words.

And he doesn’t blink,

a dry-eyed unwilling

phoenix, and say: What’s that?

Your knee is worse?

One day...

One unmuffled day.  

        -----Sara Lewis Holmes (all rights reserved) 

With thanks to Mary Lee Hahn, who gifted me with one perfect overheard word: muffled. 

What did my poetry sisters do with this challenge? What did they overhear?  Listen in:

Laura

Tricia

Andi

Tanita

Kelly

Liz

Mary Lee

Poetry Friday is hosted today by Irene Latham. 

Poetry Friday: Bells

December's challenge was to write a poem about bells.  Any kind. Any theme. Any form. 

My fellow poets in our ZOOM session had amazing ideas, about clever bell metaphors, and delicate bell sounds, and astounding bell stories.  And I had nothing but the vague feeling that I was dancing on the surface of a very deep ocean. Maybe it was because the older I grow, the more I realize how much I don't know---about bells or anything else. 

So I decided to write about that not knowing (which begins with not noticing) and for my form-- 

I took the shape of this tower:

Robert A. Taft Memorial and Carillon

What does a democracy have to do

to get noticed in this town? 

 

How could I—

walking, as I do, in my city—

America’s capitol city—

not notice a hundred-foot shaft

of Tennessee marble, host

to twenty-seven pedal-struck bells?

Not notice

the bells are a carillon— 

(which must, therefore, number

more than twenty-three— 

or be deemed but a chime.)

Not notice the bourdon,

a booming seven tons of bell—

(and also the word for the droning 

largest pipe of a organ, and the word

for bumblebee, and some clever soul

pinched the word for a fizzy drink 

that will—you guessed it— get you buzzed.)

Perhaps because noticing

leads you, on and on, 

(until your ears ring.)

So I walk again to the carillon.

It is true. Solid. There. 

 

Isn’t it?  

After all, these bells

honor President Taft’s son—

(WHO?—well, he served in the Senate, 

I’m told— he sought the Presidency

three times—oh, did he?)

—now I’m on unsteady ground

again—

but—with a bit of noticing—

I see his life rang out to his fellow Senators— 

(this is the Capitol grounds, after all—

and these bells are “a summons

to integrity and courage”)

but noticing this, I feel 

a great silence—

I dig again, to ease

the unease.

Carillons, they say, rose here after war,

an echo of those in Europe

where they were exceedingly noticed,

for the Nazis (hungry for metal)

stole all the bells—(classifying their worth

from Grade A to D) melting

the most unworthy into weapons.

Bells upon bells upon bells

were heaped in Glockenfriedhöfe—

bell cemeteries. 

Oh, how that noticing, now googled,

in hot pursuit of those two words, unearths more—

that (in some cemeteries and times past)

a bell was tucked in with the deceased, in case….

well, you know…someone didn’t

notice they weren’t really dead,

weren’t really lost—

are we?

I walk back to the carillon,

to what we command,

(by Senate Concurrent Resolution 25)

to be sounded with song every July Fourth,

at two in the afternoon.

I’ve never noticed it, you know—

not the *carillonist (chosen

by the Architect of the Capitol)

issuing forth his yearly Anthem,

his America the Beautiful—

wasn't she?

only

the hourly strike,

the daily clamor,

the steady keeping of time—

and not even that, if my mind

is elsewhere—

 

            ----Sara Lewis Holmes (all rights reserved) 

*Carillonist is the gender-neutral term.  The current player is male, so he can be called a carillonneur.  

I'm guessing he gets into the tower by this official looking back door: 

My poetry sisters are posting about bells here:

Tricia

Mary Lee

Liz

Laura

Kelly

Andi

Tanita

If you’d like to write to our theme for next month, we are going with “poetry inspired by something overheard.” Our friend Susan Thomsen at Chicken Spaghetti has done several of these as a form of “found poem,” and it seemed like a fun challenge. Here's a link to one of Susan’s poems.

Poetry Friday is hosted today at Carol's Corner. 

  

Poetry Friday: An Ode to Making Caramels

Salted Caramels
from America's Test Kitchen's 
"Made From Scratch"

November's challenge was to write an ode to some aspect of Autumn, and to try (emphasis on TRY) to avoid praising only the usual suspects.  I'm not sure if caramel qualifies (at least it's not pumpkin spice) but when I read up on odes, I learned that they not only can praise a person or thing, but also an event.  So, this is my ode to making caramels (and other lovely things.)   Recipe follows. 

Ode to making caramels

I only make caramels

with my daughter, a scientist versed

in the precise ways of heat and time;

an Autumn queen, blistering sugar

to brown gold; regulating—

without mercy— the length of summer’s heat;

quelling with a swirl of wooden spoon 

the angry sputtering; one eye 

on the thermometer, raising the heat again—

false summer, dog days, before

she commands a river of salted cream

to foam the pot; now all is downward 

warmth until she sluices desiccated sunlight

into a leaf-thin parchment sling tucked 

into the waiting pan; later, she will score 

the stiffened caramels into perfect cubes; 

equinox at last. I wrap each one

in tender scraps of waxed brown paper; 

I pinch and twirl and seal. I’m grateful 

to be her sous-chef, her apprentice, 

her lab assistant. She's unaware—

I think—of the miracle she wrought, 

it’s only the removal of water from sugar,

this caramelization; only waiting, 

only creating goodness 

slowly precisely perfectly. And even

as the baby kicks inside her, 

even as we eat, unwrapping 

what I just wrapped, no number

binds the miracles she has yet to do.

                ------Sara Lewis Holmes (all rights reserved)

Salted Caramels
from America's Test Kitchen

My poetry sisters have made some lovely odes to other aspects of Autumn.  Find them all here:

Liz

Tanita

Tricia

Kelly

Laura

Mary Lee

Andi

Poetry Friday is hosted today by Ruth at thereisnosuchthingasagodforsakentown.