December 31: Sandra McPherson, "A Pumpkin at New Year's," Happy New Year

A Pumpkin at New Year's

by:  Sandra McPherson

Heads were rolling down the highway in high slat trucks.   

I knew it was time to buy you and found you,

The last sphere unscarred and undistorted in the store,   

Big as my own head.

It was time too to leave you uncut and full-featured,   

Like the grandpa of twenty-five pumpkins in my past,   

Khrushchev-cheeked and dwelling on yourself,   

Great knee of my childhood.

I plainly thought you would rot.

I remembered the fetor of other pumpkins,

Their blue populations coming out of hiding as if at the end   

Of some apocalypse.

I devoted a day to reading up on minor cucurbits:   

I learned your dozen names in African

And came home ready to raise or raze you,   

Positive of change.

But so far—eternity. I think I would not like   

Eternity, after I had used my senses up,

As I’ve tried with you—fingertips dragging over your world   

Pole to pole

Till they go dead like explorers, nostril cilia

Detecting your fragrance more delicate than they—

And my patience. It’s Christmas, it’s a new year   

And I hear

Of a family who’s kept you for four ...

You endure like matter manufactured

And indeed your stem seems punched into your orange gathers

Like a button in a mattress.

Shall I give you a room or a shrine? And shall I   

Purchase you a mate and family,

When ours is so inadequate, fixed upon your window   

Deathbed as we are,

Centered upon a time and birth, new holiday, new friends,   

New pumpkins, celebrating when all

That has failed us has passed away.

You have not failed.

__________________________________

A poem for New Year's.

I need to go play a game with my son now.  He's forcing me to play Pugopoly, which is Monopoly with pugs.  I have always hated that game.  These are the sacrifices we make.

Saint Marty needs some champagne.  Or Cheetos.

June 5: Edward Hirsch, "A Partial History Of My Stupidity," Dumbass

A Partial History Of My Stupidity

by:  Edward Hirsch

Traffic was heavy coming off the bridge,

and I took the road to the right, the wrong one,

and got stuck in the car for hours.

Most nights I rushed out into the evening

without paying attention to the trees,

whose names I didn't know,

or the birds, which flew heedlessly on.

I couldn't relinquish my desires

or accept them, and so I strolled along

like a tiger that wanted to spring

but was still afraid of the wildness within.

The iron bars seemed invisible to others,

but I carried a cage around inside me.

I cared too much what other people thought

and made remarks I shouldn't have made.

I was silent when I should have spoken.

Forgive me, philosophers,

I read the Stoics but never understood them.

I felt that I was living the wrong life,

spiritually speaking,

while halfway around the world

thousands of people were being slaughtered,

some of them by my countrymen.

So I walked on—distracted, lost in thought—

and forgot to attend to those who suffered

far away, nearby.

Forgive me, faith, for never having any.

I did not believe in God,

who eluded me.

_________________________

I start out most of my blog posts talking about myself.  I did this.  I did that.  I hate this.  I love that.  That's what blogging is all about--giving your opinion or ideas about something, for better or worse.  I don't think that I'm an expert on anything.  In fact, I think that I'm pretty stupid about a lot of stuff.

For instance, I don't know how to change the oil on my car.  (I can barely get my spare tire out of my trunk.)

I never remember the rhyme scheme of a villanelle, even though I call myself a poet.  That's what Google is for.

I often forget to bring my lunch to work.

I yell at my kids sometimes, even though they're just being kids.

I eat things that aren't good for me, like Cheetos and chocolate milk.

I secretly love watching Impractical Jokers.

I think Richard Brautigan is kind of a genius.

I prefer Adele songs over Beyonce songs.

I don't care for superhero movies.

I like the film Midnight in Paris, even though Woody Allen is probably a sexual predator.

See what I mean?

Saint Marty is a dumbass about a lot of things.

March 1: Optometer, Ash Wednesday, Lenten Sacrifice

They were brought at last to a stone cottage at a fork in the road.  It was a collecting point for prisoners of war.  Billy and Weary were taken inside, where it was warm and smoky.  There was a fire sizzling and popping in the fireplace.  The fuel was furniture.  There were about twenty other Americans in there, sitting on the floor with their backs to the wall, staring into the flames--thinking whatever there was to think, which was zero.

Nobody talked.  Nobody had any good war stories to tell.

Billy and Weary found places for themselves, and Billy went to sleep with his head on the shoulder of an unprotesting captain.  The captain was a chaplain.  He was a rabbi.  He had been shot through the hand.

Billy traveled in time, opened his eyes, found himself staring into the glass eyes of a jade green mechanical owl.  The owl was hanging upside down from a rod of stainless steel.  The owl was Billy's optometer in his office in Ilium.  An optometer is an instrument for measuring refractive errors in eyes--in order that corrective lenses may be prescribed.

Billy had fallen asleep while examining a female patient who was in a chair on the other side of the owl.  He had fallen asleep at work before.  It had been funny at first.  Now Billy was starting to get worried about it, about his mind in general.  He tried to remember how old he was, couldn't.  He tried to remember what year it was.  He couldn't remember that, either.

Billy is an eye doctor by trade.  Time traveler by coincidence.  One minute, he's a prisoner of war.  The next, he's a confused--possibly old--man, falling asleep on the job.  He can't remember his age or the year.  And he's worried that he is losing his mind.

It is Ash Wednesday.  First day of Lent.  My forehead is smudged with a cross of ash.  It sounds like Billy is struggling in the above paragraphs.  He's not just unstuck in time anymore.  He's not even sure what time it is.  He is afraid that he's losing himself.

I went to a worship service this evening at my wife's church.  I played with the band and prayed for the people in my life.  I'm always greatly moved during the Lenten season.  I used to give things up for these 40 days.  Chocolate.  Cheetos.  Naps.  (Actually, I never take naps--so that was an easy one.)  Several years ago, I decided to pray for people for Lent.  Every day, I would pick a different person, and I would spend a good half hour lifting that person up to God.

This year, like Billy, I'm sort of lost.  I don't quite know what to do for Lent.  Nothing has really taken hold of my heart, pulling in a specific direction.  Usually, by Ash Wednesday, I already know what my Lenten practice is going to be.  This year, I'm sitting here, thinking about sacrifice and literally falling asleep.  (In my defense, it IS almost 11 p.m.)  I'm unstuck.

So, I am going to pray about it for a few more days.  Perhaps, after those days, I will simply discover that I am supposed to pray all Lent.  Give up watching The Lawrence Welk Show on Saturdays.  Work in a soup kitchen.  Start a soup kitchen.

Tonight, Saint Marty is thankful for the ashes on his forehead.  A gentle reminder of the need for sacrifice.

August 15: Heaven, Poet of the Week, Maya Angelou, "Preacher, Don't Send Me"

For some reason, Maya Angelou has been on my mind for the last few weeks or so.  It could be a television commercial that has been playing during the Olympics broadcasts, featuring Angelou's distinctive voice reading a poem about what unites us as a people.  It could be that every time I see Hillary Clinton in the newspaper or on TV, I think about her husband's first inauguration, when Angelou read her poem "On the Pulse of Morning" in the clear January day, her words rising in clouds of breath.

I have featured Angelou as Poet of the Week before.  However, not to sound childish but . . . my blog, my rules.

It's a beautiful August night.  My daughter is out with her dance friends.  My son is in need of a bath after a day of dirt and sweat.  My wife is working, and I have half a bottle of wine at home.  It's going to be a good night.  Not heaven.  I'll leave that to Angelou tonight.

Saint Marty is hoping to find some leftover Cheetos.  That would be heaven.

Preacher, Don't Send Me

by:  Maya Angelou

when I die
to some big ghetto
in the sky
where rats eat cats
of the leopard type
and Sunday brunch
is grits and tripe.

I've known those rats
I've seen them kill
and grits I've had
would make a hill,
or maybe a mountain,
so what I need
from you on Sunday
is a different creed.

Preacher, please don't
promise me
streets of gold
and milk for free.
I stopped all milk
at four years old
and once I'm dead
I won't need gold.

I'd call a place
pure paradise
where families are loyal
and strangers are nice,
where the music is jazz
and the season is fall.
Promise me that
or nothing at all.

December 4: Remembering, Joy Harjo, "Remember"

Tonight, I'm remembering a lot of things.  I'm remembering my daughter as a baby.  Tomorrow is her fourteenth birthday.  In another year, she'll be in high school.  Where did all that time go?

I'm remembering the last time I spoke to my friend, Ray.  It was the Monday of Thanksgiving week, I believe.  I saw him in the hall of the English Department as I was headed to my office.  "Hey, Marty," he called.  I stopped, and we talked about something totally inconsequential.  It might have been pecan pie versus pumpkin pie.  And then I wished him "Happy Thanksgiving," and we parted.  That was it.

Remembering is an act lined with sadness, because it's a reaching back, a grasping, for something that has been lost to the past.  My daughter will never be a baby again.  My friend, Ray, will never have pumpkin pie again.  All memory now.

Saint Marty doesn't think it's too bad to live in the past.  As long as the past includes dark chocolate, maybe some wine, and a bag of Cheetos.

Remember

by:  Joy Harjo

Remember the sky that you were born under,
know each of the star's stories.
Remember the moon, know who she is. I met her
in a bar once in Iowa City.
Remember the sun's birth at dawn, that is the
strongest point of time. Remember sundown
and the giving away to night.
Remember your birth, how your mother struggled
to give you form and breath. You are evidence of
her life, and her mother's, and hers.
Remember your father. He is your life also.
Remember the earth whose skin you are:
red earth, black earth, yellow earth, white earth
brown earth, we are earth.
Remember the plants, trees, animal life who all have their
tribes, their families, their histories, too. Talk to them,
listen to them. They are alive poems.
Remember the wind. Remember her voice. She knows the
origin of this universe. I heard her singing Kiowa war
dance songs at the corner of Fourth and Central once.
Remember that you are all people and that all people are you.
Remember that you are this universe and that this universe is you.
Remember that all is in motion, is growing, is you.
Remember that language comes from this.
Remember the dance that language is, that life is.
Remember.

 

Pass the bottle and the Cheetos

August 15: End of a Long Day

I just got home from a poet friend's house.  I was proofreading the manuscript of her new book of short stories.  I am absolutely brain dead.  Tired doesn't even begin to describe how I feel.  After saying goodbye to my coworker/friend this afternoon, I wasn't really in the best of moods when I got home.  I went for a short run to try to shake off (or leave in the dust) my sadness.  It sort of worked.  My little editing session kept my mind busy for the rest of the evening.

And now, at the end of this very long day, I'm looking forward to a good night's sleep.  Or a mediocre night's sleep.  Heck, I'll even be satisfied with a fitful night's sleep, as long as I get to stay in bed past 4 a.m. tomorrow.

I don't want to think about going back to the medical office next week.  I don't want to think about all the work that's going to be stacked up.  I'm already a little overwhelmed as it is.  I don't need to get myself all wound up right before I head off to dreamland.  I've been having enough trouble getting to sleep these last few nights.

Saint Marty doesn't want to think about anything right now.  Except maybe Cheetos.  And pizza.

These could keep me awake

December 31: Balloons, Cheetos, and Hope

Well, I finished decorating for the New Year's Eve party.  The balloons are inflated and dangling from the ceiling.  Pretty much, it's all over but the eating and drinking.  And blogging.

I've been trying to come up with some scrap of wisdom I've gained from the year 2012.  It hasn't been easy.  I mean, nothing has really changed for me.  I'm still part-time at the university (although, I'm unionized now, so I'm officially underpaid).  I'm still working for the outpatient surgery center (although, the surgery center is owned by a national health care organization now, so I'm being undervalued locally and from a distance).  I'm still looking for a publisher for my new book of poems, and I'm still living in the same house.  Money is still an issue for us, and exhaustion is still pretty much my constant companion.

President Obama was reelected, and Mitt Romney was sent back to his multi-million dollar estates and life.  (I'm still not sure who got the better deal there.)  The Middle East is still in upheaval, and school shootings in the United States are still a constant reality.  America is still a long way away from universal healthcare, and I still haven't won the Nobel Prize in Literature (or the Pulitzer Prize or the National Book Award) or been named Adjunct of the Year.

My daughter is gorgeous and twelve.  My son is destructive and four.  The oil companies are still bleeding us dry at the gas pumps, and Cheetos are still one of my favorite snacks.

Tonight, at the stroke of midnight, I will raise my cup of sparkling fruit juice and toast the new year with my family and friends.  It will be a moment of happiness and hope.  A time when anything seems possible.  A tenured professorship at the university.  A new home.  A Best Actress Oscar for Miss Piggy.  (Hey, I said anything.)  Hope is the flavor of the day.

Saint Marty is ready to sing "Auld Lang Syne."

10...9...8..7..6...5...

October 18: Heaven, and the Christmas Time

"...Heaven, and the Christmas Time be praised for this!..."

Scrooge says this little ejaculation of praise on Christmas morning, right after the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come returns him to his the "real" world.  Scrooge is grateful to be alive.  He is grateful for the cold, snowy morning.  He is grateful for his dark, dusty apartment.  He is grateful for everything in his life.

Last night, I found myself in a very dark place.  I was contemplating a few issues in my life, and I just couldn't shake off the negative thoughts.  Therefore, I have decided this morning to focus on the blessings in my life.  I know I have done this exercise several times already on this blog.  However, I think it's a good thing to repeat.

Thus, on to the blessings:

My son, who is funny and healthy and full of energy.  (Maybe a little too full of energy, but that's OK.)

My daughter, who is smart and beautiful and graceful as a swan.

My wife, who is smart and beautiful and employed.  (That's a double blessing.)

My house, which keeps my family warm and comfortable.

My car, which runs and gets me to work.

My job in the medical office, where I'm surrounded by people I love.

My job at the university, where I get to talk about things that I love.

Cheetos, because I love them.

Diet Mountain Dew, because I love it.

My friends, who bring me so much joy.

My family, because they're crazy and loving.

My wife's family, because they're crazy and loving.

My health, which is good.

Poetry, which makes me see beauty in everything.

God, Who is the source of all of the above.

Saint Marty's cup overflows.

September 18: Royale with Cheese

I think it may be the weather, but everybody I'm around today is hungry.  Bottomless stomach hungry.  I, myself, am experiencing this phenomenon, as well.  I think that when the temperatures start to dip below the 40-degree range at night, us Yoopers (people who live in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan) have this instinct to start eating.  It's in preparation for the upcoming winter months.  We're packing on the pounds to keep warm.  It's all about survival.

Of course, I'm probably simply justifying my consumption of not-so-healthy foods.  I find myself craving cheese products today.  Cheese sticks.  Cheesy broccoli soup.  I watched the first part of Pulp Fiction this afternoon with my film class, and, when Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta started talking about a Royale with Cheese from McDonald's, I got so hungry I could have eaten the textbook.  It's just one of those days.  Milky Ways.  Fritos.  Cheetos.  Baked potatoes.  Bacon.  Lucky Charms.  Vanilla Coke Zero.  Chicken Alfredo pizza.  I want it all.

But especially, Saint Marty wants a Royale with Cheese.


I want a bite of that mother fu#@er!



August 3: Things You Shouldn't Do While Blogging

There are many things you shouldn't do while blogging.  Top of my list at the moment is watching the Olympics.  I have had my laptop in front of me for the past hour, and I have typed nothing, zero, zilch.  All I had up to a few seconds ago was just the blinking cursor.

Another thing you shouldn't do while blogging is eating Cheetos.  It makes for orange fingers, orange keys, and orange computers.  Cheetos and any kind of electronic device involving software just don't mix.

Going to the bathroom.  Let's just leave it at that.

Taking a shower.  Generally, whatever you are doing in the shower doesn't belong in a blog post.  Plus, like Cheetos, water and computers do not mix.

Drinking alcohol.  Some people may argue with me on this one.  However, drunk blogging is like drunk dialing.  You will post something embarrassing, possibly even a compromising picture of yourself.  Whether deleted later or not, a drunk blog post is a mistake.

Watching TV in general.  My current distraction is the Olympics.  However, even if the TV is tuned to something you don't even like (Bill O'Reilly say), you will watch the TV and not type anything.  Keep the TV turned off.

Cooking.  This is not a hard-and-fast rule for every blogger.  Just for myself.  If I blogged and cooked at the same time, something is going to burn, boil over, or explode.  I would probably end up microwaving my iPad.

Having sex.  Of course, this depends upon the kind of blog you are writing.  Nuff said.

(OK, now I'm watching diving in the Olympics.  I'm not even that interested in diving.  I am totally pathetic.)

Last thing I want to warn fellow bloggers not to do while blogging:  having quality time with your significant other.  Your significant other will insist on reading your blog post when you are done, and when he or she discovers you have been writing about the Olympics or cleaning up dog crap in the backyard, you will end up in the doghouse yourself.

That is the extent of Saint Marty's wisdom this evening.  Now, he's going to go eat some Cheetos, cook some Ramen noodles, go to the bathroom, have sex with his wife, and watch Michael Phelps swim.  Not in that order, necessarily.




Even this idiot can distract you!



June 14: Neglected Grave, Mortal Coil, Last Day

Scrooge crept towards it, trembling as he went; and following the finger, read upon the stone of the neglected grave his own name, EBENEZER SCROOGE.

Most of my disciples can probably guess where this little paragraph occurs in A Christmas Carol.  It is the culmination of the visit of the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come.  In it, Scrooge is given the unpleasant revelation of his imminent demise.  Judging from all the evidence, Scrooge's death is fast approaching.  Not ten years down the line.  Not five years down the line.  The impression I've always gotten from reading the book is that Scrooge is going to die within a year. 

The main clues for this assumption come from the death of Tiny Tim.  The Ghost of Christmas Present predicts, "If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, none other of my race...will find him here."  That means that Tiny Tim will be dead within a year.  In the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come stave, Scrooge sees Bob Cratchit mourning over his son's body.  A few scenes later, the paragraph above appears.  That means that Scrooge is already planted in the ground by the time Tiny Tim shuffles off this mortal coil.  Scrooge has less than a year to live at this point in the narrative.

I've posed this scenario to my Good Books students in the past:  if you suddenly heard God's voice in your ear, and God's voice told you, "You will die next Tuesday at 3:17 p.m. EST," what would you do?  The answer I invariably receive is not sit in a classroom with me, talking about Great Expectations or The Grapes of Wrath.  They would be out with their family or girlfriends or boyfriends.  They would spend their remaining time with their kids.  They wouldn't worry about their finances.  In fact, 100% of my students don't even mention money, unless they intend to purchase gifts for loved ones.  That last mortgage payment for J. P. Morgan Chase doesn't even make a blip on the radar.  It doesn't even make the top 100 list of things to do.

Certainly, when Scrooge is faced with the reality of his untimely end, it changes him.  Actually, it scares the shit out of him.  He can no longer go back to his old life and old habits.  He must embrace a different way of thinking and acting.  I know, if I were in the position of knowing my final dance was approaching, I wouldn't be blogging.  I wouldn't be working.  I wouldn't be doing a lot of the things I normally do every day.

That's what makes the difference for Scrooge.  It should make a difference for everybody.  There's no guarantee, when you eat that bowl of Rice Krispies this morning, that you will be around to finish off the box of Rice Krispies tomorrow.  That should make us hug our daughters a little longer.  Enjoy that Milky Way bar a little more.  Listen to those birds singing for a few extra minutes.  I know it would change my day(s) drastically.

Maybe I should live today like it is my last day.  Make choices that really count, that make me happy.

Saint Marty needs to go.  He has a family-size bag of Cheetos and a pan of brownies to eat.

Judgement Day is here.  Grab a spoon.

March 5: Retention, Brownies, Pajama Night

I have been able to retain my good mood for a good portion of the day.  Except for a few moments of crabbiness, everything has gone almost exactly the way I planned.  I got a very good chunk of my projects completed.  I didn't experience any stress, for the most part.  And I worked with people I don't hate.  All of these factors simply enhanced the general goodness glow of the day.

The other good thing that happened today is that my wife was offered a part-time job at a local credit union as a teller.  I'm excited for her and for us.  Hopefully, we won't struggle with money so much having a second income.  Of course, there's a part of me that gets a little nervous about my wife's sexual addiction and bipolar disease.  When she's at home, there's a bubble of safety that exists, at least in my mind.  That bubble's going to be popping next Monday.  But, this news is welcome and good.  I give thanks for it.

Tonight, I have to make brownies for a potluck at work tomorrow.  That means I have to stop at that gulag of consumerism, Wal-Mart, on my way home from the office.  I hate going to that place at any hour of the day, but at 5 p.m., it's like paying for a fraternity hazing.  I can't avoid it, however.

The good news is that, once I get home, I can change into my pajamas and not leave the house for the rest of the evening.  For those of my disciples who don't think putting pajamas on at 6 p.m. is thrilling, I would encourage you to try it, supplemented with hot chocolate and/or a bag of Cheetos (the crunchy kind).

Saint Marty may even spike his hot chocolate with a little Bailey's tonight.

Care to join in the fun?  I'll bring the Cheetos