June 13: Take 2, New Poem, Surprises

Yes, I did write a poem this morning.  Therefore, this post will be the second one for today.  Two more (with new cartoons in them) are on the way this evening, when I can get to a scanner.

When I started writing this poem, I thought it was going to follow a certain path.  However, sometimes poems don't cooperate with the poet.  I found myself writing about things I had no intention of writing about.  Let me put a disclaimer on this poem.  It's a disclaimer a lot of poets place upon their work:  don't confuse the speaker of the poem with the poet.  While most writers (including poets) use details from their lives in their writing, it is very dangerous to think that all the details of a poem are true.  There is truth in all poems.  That's the difference.  It's a fine line.  It's sort of like thinking Catcher in the Rye is true because Holden seems so real.  There is truth in Salinger's book, but it is not non-fiction in any way.  Get it?

If it sounds like I'm trying to cover my ass, I'm not.  I'm pretty open about my life.  All you have to do is read this blog to realize that.  As Forrest Gump would say, "That's all I got to say about that."

Saint Marty, setting the record straight.

Holes

My son slapped my wife

Across the face yesterday.

Hard.  Made her ears ring,

Eyes water.  Only two, my son stared

At my wife, who cried, rubbed

Her cheek as if she’d been

Stung by a wasp.  He didn’t

Understand my wife’s tears,

Why she looked at him

Like he’d just pulled

A gun on her, wanted her

To surrender her wedding band,

Anything she held dear.

Now that I’m grown, I hear

Stories from my sisters

How my father punched

Holes in the bedroom wall

When he got angry with Mom,

How Mom hung framed

Cross stitch and photos over

The holes, airbrushed Dad’s temper

Away so we kids wouldn’t

Be frightened of him.

I remember one picture

In my parents’ room:

Them at a campfire, brown necks

Of beer in their hands,

My dad’s arm draped around

Mom’s shoulder, smiles on both

Their faces.  He looked calm,

Happy as Jimmy Stewart

After the angel gave him

His life back on Christmas Eve.

My wife tells me how my son

Comes to her today, puts his head

On her knees, pets her leg,

Fingers soft as a blade of grass.

He harbors my wife’s tears

In some hidden part of himself,

Like the holes in my parents’ walls,

Those places families hide

Savings bonds and fists,

Grandmother’s wedding rings,

Bruises and strings of pearls.

Anything children will inherit.