May 31, 2025: "The Month of June: 13 1/2," Grad, "Graduation Party"

It is that time of year when young people march in caps and gowns, high school orchestras struggle through "Pomp and Circumstance," and parents feel old.

Sharon Olds' daughter matriculates . . . 

The Month of June: 13 1/2

by: Sharon Olds

As our daughter approaches graduation and
puberty at the same time, at her
own, calm, deliberate, serious rate,
she begins to kick up her heels, jazz out her
hands, thrust out her hipbones, chant
I’m great! I’m great! She feels 8th grade coming
open around her, a chrysalis cracking and
letting her out, it falls behind her and
joins the other husks on the ground,
7th grade, 6th grade, the
magenta rind of 5th grade, the
hard jacket of 4th when she had so much pain,
3rd grade, 2nd, the dim cocoon of
1st grade back there somewhere on the path, and
kindergarten like a strip of thumb-suck blanket
taken from the actual blanket they wrapped her in at birth.
The whole school is coming off her shoulders like a
cloak unclasped, and she dances forth in her
jerky sexy child’s joke dance of
self, self, her throat tight and a
hard new song coming out of it, while her
two dark eyes shine
above her body like a good mother and a
good father who look down and
love everything their baby does, the way she
lives their love.

It's difficult for parents to see their children grow, mature into thinking, autonomous creatures.  We always want our kids to stay small, dependent.  Each passing year makes us more and more obsolete.  Pretty soon, you're sitting in bleachers, watching your offspring stride across a stage to collect a piece of paper that pretty much says, "Congratulations!  It's up to you now!"

I went to a graduation party this morning for the son of one of my best friends.  I've watched this young man grow from a quiet kid to a smart, outgoing high school senior.  I used to tower over him.  He now towers over me.  

He's an amazing, empathetic kid.  (I say "kid" because that's what he'll always be to me.)  When I think about the future, I worry a little less because I know young people like him exist.  My generation (and the generation before) has fucked up the world pretty bad and still continues to do so.  It's up to my friend's son and his generation to somehow rescue it.  And I think they will.

Saint Marty wrote a poem tonight about this grad time of year, based on the following prompt from The Daily Poet:  

On this day in 1859, Big Ben became a working clock in London, England.  For a long time, hearing the bells throughout the city was how Londoners knew what time it was.  Write a poem where the reader knows what time it is and what season it is through the details of your poem.  Do not use words like morning, evening, winter, summer, but let the poem reflect the time of day or season by what is happening in the poem and by the images you use.  For extra credit, have someone in the poem running late of showing up early.

Graduation Party

for E. F.

by: Martin Achatz

I observe the evolution of this boy

from just born to just graduated,

the table jammed with photos,

crayon drawings, poems about pizza

and dogs, ribbons for spelling,

finally a diploma and tassel.

It's like those charts in biology

class:  Dryopithecus to Homo

habalis, erectus, neanderthalensis,

sapien--crawling to knuckling to 

walking.  Now, he sits at a table

with friends, plate piled with

donuts, muffins, bacon and cheese

quiche, his first meal on this day 

after when all he can think about

is tomorrow and tomorrow, his spine

straightening, thick fur melting away,

brain expanding to make room

for the invention of fire.

May 30, 2025: "The Moment the Two Worlds Meet," Vacations, "Honeymoon at Seashell City"

I took today off work, and then I pretty much worked all day long--on poems and cover letters and resumés and church music.  My life rarely is without tasks that need to be completed, for the library or university or churches or home.  

I also spent a lot of time thinking about my kids--my daughter who's 24 and heading off to med school in a couple months, and my son who's 16 and will be a senior next school year.  It seems like yesterday they were just tadpoles swimming in my wife's belly.

Sharon Olds reflects on the birth of a child . . . 

The Moment the Two Worlds Meet

by: Sharon Olds

That's the moment I always think of--when the
slick, whole body comes out of me,
when they pull it out, not pull it but steady it
as it pushes forth, not catch it but keep their
hands under it as it pulses out,
they are the first to touch it,
and it shines, it glistens with the thick liquid on it.
That's the moment, while it's sliding, the limbs
compressed close to the body, the arms
bent like a crab's cloud-muscle legs, the
thighs packed plums in heavy syrup, the
legs folded like the wings of a chicken--
that is the center of life, that moment when the
juiced, bluish sphere of the baby is
sliding between the two worlds,
wet, like sex, it is sex,
it is my life opening back and back
as you'd strip the reed from the bud, not strip it but
watch it thrust so it peels itself and the
flower is there, severely folded, and
then it begins to open and dry
but by then the moment is over,
they wipe off the grease and wrap the child in a blanket and
hand it to you entirely in this world.

Sharon Olds pretty much captures the experience of childbirth for women in this poem.  For nine months, the fetus swims in its own little liquid world of heartbeat.  Then the woman's body opens, and a new body appears, becomes a part of this world we all know.  That previous world of ocean and warmth and music becomes ancestral.

It always feels to me like I'm shuttling back and forth between different worlds.  Library world to university world to poetry world to church world to blog world.  I've juggled this whole solar system of worlds most of my life.  Occasionally (not often in the last couple years), I'm able to take a break, visit an uncharted world to just relax and forget about life on my other planets.

I haven't taken a true traveling vacation for quite a while.  No lounging on the beaches of Cancun.  No climbing the Swiss Alps.  No tours of the Louvre.  Instead, when I take time off, I stay home with my dog, sleep a lot, write a lot, read a lot, and binge TV a lot.  

It is the cusp of full summer now.  As I said, my daughter is moving away in a little over a month, and, in a week or so, my son will finish up his junior year of high school.  My worlds are going to shift and expand again.  I'll probably be on the road a lot more in the coming years.  I have no idea what birthdays and holidays are going to be like.  To paraphrase the book of Exodus, I will be a stranger in a strange world again.

Saint Marty wrote a poem about vacations for tonight, based on the following prompt from The Daily Poet:

Write two ten-line pomes about two places you've visited--one that you loved and one you disliked or didn't like as well.  Now, intersperse the lines of the place-you-loved poem with the lines of the place-you-didn't-like-so-much poem until you have one twenty-line poem.

Honeymoon at Seashell City

by: Martin Achatz

we stand at the edge of that igneous

moonscape in the dark, watch

a man-eating clam under glass, mouth

propped open, a mousetrap waiting for

the lava roar off the cliff into the Pacific,

a sound like the beginning of the world

a curious toddler to wander by,

boxes of dried starfish, polished conchs

in our ears, so loud I have to press

my lips to my wife's ear for her

displayed like produce in a grocery store,

tomato snail shells, sea cucumbers

to hear my words even though I really

have nothing to say about Hadean

carved wooden gull glued onto a piece

of driftwood bleached almost white

oceans under her body's volcanic pull and

my hunger for the magma of her skin

by waves and sun and time while

the Beach Boys croon about Kokomo and surf

May 29, 2025: "I Cannot Forget the Woman in the Mirror," Quiet, "Poem for an Ordinary Day on which I Wasn't Exposed to Measles and Lilacs Are Beginning to Bloom"

Some days are just . . . quiet.  

Nothing special happens.  No catastrophes or Nobel Prizes.  You just get up, go about your normal, daily business, have dinner, maybe watch a little television, and then go to bed.

Most people don't realize that quiet days like today are gifts.  Blessings.  Full of common, everyday miracles.

Sharon Olds writes about living her true life . . . 

I Cannot Forget the Woman in the Mirror

by: Sharon Olds

Backwards and upside down in the twilight, that
woman on all fours, her head
dangling, and suffused, her lean
haunches, the area of darkness, the flanks and
ass narrow and pale as a deer's and those
breasts hanging down toward the center of the earth like 

               plummets, when I
swayed from side to side they swayed, it was
so near night I couldn’t tell if they were yellow or
violet or rose. I cannot get over her
moving toward him upside down in the mirror like a
fly on the ceiling, her head hanging down and her
tongue long and purple as an anteater's
going toward his body, she was so clearly a human
animal, she was an Iroquois scout creeping
naked and noiseless, and when I looked at her
she looked at me so directly, her eyes all
pupil, her stare said to me I
belong here, this is mine, I am living out my
true life on this earth.

Olds isn't describing anything earthshattering in this poem.  It's simply a sexual encounter in front of a mirror, her watching her mirror self "living out" her "true life on this earth."  

Most of people aren't really cognizant of their true lives.  They go through their daily routines with blinders on, moving from one mundane thing to another.  That pretty much describes almost every one of my days.  I never really stop to smell the lilacs.  Instead, I rush everywhere, trying to milk as much productivity as I can out of each second that passes.

I literally have to remind myself to pause, look around, and give thanks for all the quotidian miracles around me.  Staples.  A good fountain pen.  Sunlight.  A bad joke.  A good joke.  A nickel in my pocket.  Trillium blossoming in the backyard.  Because I'm a poet, I do this kind of thing all the time.  If you look for moments of grace, you'll find they.  Or they will find you.

Now, not all grace is beautiful or transcendent.  The writer Flannery O'Connor said this about grace:  "All human nature vigorously resists grace because grace changes us and the change is painful . . . The reader wants his grace warm and binding, not dark and disruptive."  Ultimately, all grace is good, even if it causes discomfort or pain.  

Yes, it's difficult to see grace in all situations.  Yet, if you look around right now, I'd bet you could list at least five things for which you're grateful.  Gratitude is an acknowledgement of grace.

Saint Marty wrote a poem about grace tonight, based on the following prompt from The Daily Poet:

On this day in 1903, comedian Bob Hope was born.  Bob Hope was known for his own rendition of the song "Thanks For The Memories."  Write a poem where you give thanks, but make sure it includes humor as well as gratitude.

Poem for an Ordinary Day

     on which I Wasn't Exposed to Measles

     and Lilacs Are Beginning to Bloom

by: Martin Achatz

Nothing happened today.

The sun rose.  I ate breakfast.

My son went to school.  I went

to work, as did my wife.

Had a spinach salad for lunch,

topped with chicken breast and flax seeds.

Ate two Hershey bars for dessert.

Read about a measles case reported

in my county.  Immediately checked

my body for welts and rubeola.

Two birds shit on my freshly washed

car.  Found a joint in the backseat.

Probably my son's.  Smoked it.

Ate a hotdog for dinner, then took

my dog for a walk.  Ended up at a local

ice cream shop.  Ordered a vanilla malt.

Stood in my backyard for 20 minutes

surrounded by lungs of lilacs

inhaling, exhaling the dusky light.

Jesus, I wish every day could be like this.

May 26, 2025: "Topography," Memorial Day, "Taps"

Yes, it is Memorial Day in the United States.  Every year, on the last Monday of the month of May, we celebrate and honor members of the U.S. armed forces who sacrificed their lives to defend our nation.  This year, more than any other, it's even more important to remember the true meaning of this day--the preservation of freedom and democracy against tyranny, hatred, and authoritarianism.

Sharon Olds writes about the United States . . . 

Topography

by: Sharon Olds

After we flew across the country we
got in bed, laid our bodies
intricately together, like maps laid
face to face, East to West, my
San Francisco against your New York, your
Fire Island against my Sonoma, my
New Orleans deep in your Texas, your Idaho
bright on my Great Lakes, my Kansas
burning against your Kansas your Kansas
burning against my Kansas, your Eastern
Standard Time pressing into my
Pacific Time, my Mountain Time
beating against your Central Time, your
sun rising swiftly from the right my
sun rising swiftly from the left your
moon rising slowly from the left my
moon rising slowly from the right until
all four bodies of the sky
burn above us, sealing us together,
all our cities twin cities,
all our states united, one
nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Okay, Olds' poem is about sex.  It's not very subtle in that regard.  However, it's also about the freedom of speech (that's the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution for all those MAGA readers who've never read the document upon which our entire country is based).  Olds can write a sex poem using the United States metaphorically and parodying the Pledge of Allegiance simply because it's her Constitutional right.

In other countries ruled by fascist dictators, poets have been thrown in jail for criticizing political leaders.  Stalin did it.  Putin is still doing it.  Fortunately, the Constitution prevents President 47 from doing it in the United States (for now).  All those brave members of the U.S. military who fought and died in armed conflicts did so in order to bear "true faith and allegiance to the Constitution" (that's in the oath all enlisted personnel take--check it out if you don't believe me).  They sacrificed their lives so Olds could exercise her Constitutional rights as a U.S. citizen.

I was raised to respect and honor all military veterans.  From a very young age, I knew that Memorial Day wasn't just about a three-day weekend and hotdogs and corn on the cob.  It's about who we are and what ideals we should all hold dear, regardless of political affiliation.  

I went to a Memorial Day parade with my family today.  Then, we attended a Veterans of Foreign Wars service at a local cemetery.  We placed flowers at the graves of relatives, including my father, who was a military veteran.

I am not a hater or war-monger or xenophobe.  I believe in the worth of everyone, no matter where you come from, what you believe, or who you love.  As a Christian, I was taught that all human beings are children of God.  Kindness and compassion should be the guiding force of everything we do.

If you don't agree with these ideals, you are NOT a true patriot and you are NOT a true Christian.  Sorry, not sorry.  Read the Constitution and the Bible.  It's pretty straightforward.

Saint Marty wrote a poem for Memorial Day based on the following prompt from The Daily Poet:

Write a poem where the first word starts with "A" and the last word of the poem ends with "Z."  Somewhere in the poem mention the alphabet or alphabetical order.  Have the poem be about something that has nothing to do with the alphabet.  For extra credit, try to use a word that begins with each letter of the alphabet.

Taps

by: Martin Achatz

At my father's grave today,

a flag licks the bright

air as if whispering 

his name, mustering  him

to attention, him standing

straight as a cornstalk

as my mother's ashes

sigh beside him, tell

him to settle down,

relax until the angels

blow "Reveille" and all

the war dead fall in,

waiting to be counted

one last time before marching

off to that final reckoning, 

from Private Second Class

Achatz to Staff Sergeant Zamora.