Zen Backfire
by: Billy Collins
The only time
I cut myself shaving
is when I'm aware
that I'm shaving.
Most of the things I do in a day are mindless activities, including shaving. I don't think about how to shave each time I lift a razor to my face. And I don't review all the rules of driving before I sit behind a wheel and turn the key in the ignition. I rely on muscle memory. My body, through continuous repetition, simply knows how to shave in the morning and drive to work.
Billy Collins is right, though. The moment you start thinking about shaving or operating a motor vehicle is the moment bad things happen. I tie my shoes all the time, but, when my daughter was young and asked me how to tie her shoes, I had a hell of a time explaining the steps.
It is one day past the end of the semester now, and I had to think, really think, about what I was going to do today. After having the same routine for almost five months, I now need to retrain my mind and body. I'll have to do the same at the end of August when I start teaching again. Every three or four months, I have to reinvent myself.
In a lot of ways, writing a poem has become muscle memory for me. I've been creating poetry for so long that I almost immediately recognize things like weak verbs, trite imagery, clunky lines. That doesn't mean every time I sit down with my journal I write "The Emperor of Ice Cream" or "The Pope's Penis." But I can and often do avoid very common mistakes made by less-experienced poets.
When I meet a stranger, usually one of the first question I get asked is "What do you do?" There are easy answers to that question. I teach at a university. I schedule programs at a public library. I play the pipe organ at a few different churches. But the answer that is closest to who I am is: I am a poet.
Try saying that to a complete stranger and see what kind of reaction you get. If you're at a party, suddenly your conversation partner becomes infatuated with the bean dip. If you're on an airplane, your seatmate will begin staring out the window at the clouds.
Truth frightens people.
My name is Saint Marty, and I am a poet. Run for the hills.
Existential Sundae
by: Martin Achatz
If I define a sundae
as ice cream with hot fudge,
is it still a sundae
if I add whipped cream
and a maraschino cherry?
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