Stanzas Written in a Canoe While Eating a Peach

I wish I could spend my life in a canoe

trolling the muddy, cat-tail covered shores

atop the smooth shallows of a Minnesota lake.

 

The lazy turtles basking in the midday sun,

the curious cubs with their reassuring mothers,

and the families of thirsty deer that I meet

will be my guides, my teachers, my companions,

and loneliness will cease to exist.

 

I’ll paddle wherever I want to go until my oar

strikes a stone concealed by silt and shatters;

then     I will float easily following the breeze

as it gently pushes me from shore to shore.

 

I will write my thoughts in a journal

until it is destroyed in the cascade of the first stormy night;

afterwards     I will never have another thought again.

 

And in the temple of the lily,

balanced delicately upon the lake,

amid her welcoming, angel wing petals,

I will finally find true inner peace.

***

(Longville, MN -- June, 2017)

As I was recovering from a concussion I suffered in a pick-up basketball game, I decided to take a break from my constant state of worry to visit my grandparent's cabin. Early one morning, I grabbed a notebook and took my grandpa's canoe out for a spin to spend a bit of time in quiet reflection. Little did I know, I'd find one of the only true moments of tranquility during this time in my life. Luckily, I was able to write what I was feeling as I was feeling it before setting my pencil down and taking some deep breaths and enjoying my peach.

Verses Written in My Mind while Waiting in Line at an Amusement Park

 Sometimes I'm afraid that the fatalists are right,

that our lives are moving along on a track

laid out long before we were conceived,

with twists, dips, turns, and hills that we won't see coming

before either grinding to a halt or easing to a gentle stop.

But just because we didn't design the ride

doesn't mean it has to be any less fun.

We should let the fear build as we slowly climb

and scream the whole way down;

raise our hands, letting our bodies

jerk and press against the harness;

and smile the entire time,

so whenever that hidden flashbulb goes off we look our best.

After all, we waited billions of years to be born,

and I've been waiting in line for this roller coaster

for over an entire God damn hour.

***

(Minneapolis, MN -- May, 2017)

Similar to the previous poems, I was trying to figure out what to do with my life. In the meantime, I took a poetry class at The Loft in Minneapolis and wrote this before one of our sessions. This poem came out of the thought that every chemical reaction that causes our thoughts and actions is dictated by the same laws of physics and the same chemistry as the movement of the stars and the eruption of science fair volcanoes and the twists and turns of roller coasters. By that same line of reasoning, everything that every happened and ever will happen in our lives and in the entire Universe was determined at the moment of the Big Bang, but does that mean we need to despair?

The First Noble Truth

Life brings suffering.

Exactly.

Life brings suffering.

 

And that pain is caused by desire,

by a pressing urge to live.

Sure, those yearnings can be killed,

putting an end to the torment,

but that is the moment one dies too, for

life brings suffering.

 

So, I choose instead to love,

seeing heartbreak looming;

try,

prepared to come face-to-face with failure;

and to lust after my cravings,

knowing it'll only lead to regret.

 

The one thing I will never do, though,

is to try to extinguish myself.

I will let my soul burn, burn, burn

and leave a trail of scorched earth

following me everywhere that I go.

***

(Minneapolis, MN -- May, 2017)

In the wake of returning home from the Peace Corps, having failed miserably, I was trying to make sense of the shift from being a promising chemistry student to someone with no money, no prospects, and not even enough motivation to drag themselves out of bed in the morning to hold down a real job. I read all of my philosophy books, watched a million YouTube videos, and explored the ideas in every different religion before deciding to lean into everything as opposed to separating myself from it. If life is like wine, I decided it's best to get drunk instead of being abstinent. No offense to Buddhism. Obviously, if you believe you've been reincarnated a million times and that you've experienced everything there is to experience, then finding enlightenment makes total sense. If not, then I feel like you should fill your life with as much living as possible, and that means to good stuff and the bad.  

Algolagnia

 Beauty does not beget the beautiful.

Rather, it is born in the harshest climes,

in treacherous and wretched terrains

inhabited by phantoms, by demons, with great fiends

lurking in the shadows. It can only be gotten

by the suicidal, ready to give their lives,

and the sick minds who thrive among the horrors.

 

The truest, most profound secrets of philosophy

hide in the darkest crags to be found

by those so afflicted that they'd rather reside in dreadful solitude

searching for wisdom than be safe among man.

 

The poet, too, to be at their best,

must reside in a flat circle of misery,

a state of perpetual heartache and agony

driven like Yeats by a lover who wouldn't trade talent for joy.

 

As such, most euphoric release comes

only with your teeth planted sharply in my shoulder,

claws raking my back, and your hair gripped tightly in my fist.

***

(Angoche, Mozambique -- March, 2017)

I heard a podcast or something about how W.B. Yeats' girlfriend dumped him because his poetry sucked when he was too happy (don't fact check that), and given my inclination at that point in my life to indulge in my own depression and anxiety, that resonated with me. My apologies to any family members that read this poem. 

Black Mamba

Your bite came so quickly and with such surgical precision,

that had I not seen it with my own eyes, I would not have known

that your delicate fangs had stricken me at all.

So soft was their touch, the puncture brought no pain.

I start to panic once I realize my fate,

but as I see your slender body slithering away,

those mercury scales glistening in the African sun,

I am smitten by your finesse and your grace.

I could never hate a creature as beautiful as you.

 

My lips start to tingle, hairs stand on end,

and uneasiness grips my stomach.

My sight blurs gently like the movement of a raft

being pushed ever so slowly to a waterfall that will send me

plummeting into an abyss of jagged darkness.

 

My body begins to slip from my being,

when the sorcery in your sting seizes me.

That sweet, venomous byproduct, more potent than morphine

brings euphoria, a fatal love for this moment,

and all tragedy is lost to a pure sense of pleasure.

 

I am glad to know

that despite you bringing me my end,

you’ve shown me intoxication beyond what most have known.

Your lethal kiss doomed me, but I am not upset.

Our paths crossed, I felt your gifts,

and now, completely at peace, I let the bliss fade to black.

***

(Minneapolis, MN -- May, 2016)

This was one of the last poems I wrote for my poetry class. As I was preparing to join the Peace Corps in Mozambique (I hope I don't fail miserably!), I was watching wildlife documentaries about the animals that live in that corner of Africa. I found the documentary I watched on black mamba snakes particularly interesting because they said that the venom gives a euphoric experience as it kills you. That seemed like it could be applied to love, so I wrote this poem. It wasn't a true story until it was. 

Verses Written Atop Raton Pass, NM

 Dying, driving through the dry and dusty desert

Smelling the stale sands coming though my car’s fans,

The blue Buick burning and turning timidly

Through the winding and wandering thoroughfare

As golden sands covered with greyish grasses graced my sides,

And flat plateaus rose on the horizon.

I was soaked in a sultry sweat roasting, in the midday sun

When the ochre reds around the road formed the Rockies.

Sapphire saplings surrounded the street

Standing on the snow-capped slopes

With vermillion mud lying beneath their limbs

Like leftover desolation daring the ascent,

The colors clashing like the opposing climes

And I slowly climbed and climbed until my car

Powered to the peak where I stopped to take in the scene

And freely breathe the desert mountain air

In a tranquil silence surrounded by storming semis.

***

(Raton Pass, NM -- March, 2016)

I wrote this poem on that very same road trip to the Grand Canyon. The task: write a poem that emphasizes sound. To understand this poem, you have to understand the state of my car. The motors for the windows had broken, so they were held in place with screws. Shortly after that, the sunroof had started leaking, which I repaired by covering the whole thing in duct tape. As I drove more and more miles, I noticed the car began to overheat. The easiest way to fix this was by turning on the heat. As a result, the entire time I drove through the desert, I was covered in sweat. Then, I started climbing the mountains working my way back up north, and I came across one of the most beautiful landscapes I had every seen where the mountains met the dessert. I pulled off the highway at the lookout point and immediately wrote my poem. Little did I know that my catalytic convert was due to crap out on me a few days later, leaving me stranded in Castle Rock, Colorado.  

 

 

College (an imitation of "America" by Allen Ginsberg)

College you’ve taken the best years of my life.

College a quarter tank of gas Spring Break 2016.

I don’t like my brain.

College when will we defeat ignorance?

Take your answers and go straight to hell.

Leave me alone I’m thinking.

I won’t declare my major until I know who I am.

College when will you be enlightened?

When will you be as diverse as your brochures?

When will you deserve your great minds?

College why are your lecture halls built on broken dreams?

College why couldn’t you teach me to be happy in the same way you taught me how to

integrate functions written in spherical coordinates?

College Foucault is making me an anarchist.

I’m tired of your system.

College don’t you see we’re all brilliant in our own way?

Your lectures are too loud for me.

You told me I should want to be rich.

There has to be a better way to have this debate.

College how can you liberate me if you’re burying me in debt?

College why do mental illnesses always seem to manifest themselves in your libraries?

College why are most of my best friends either books or caffeinated beverages?

I almost had a thought.

I’ll never make up my mind.

College stop trying to tell me who I am.

College your ivory tower is crumbling.

I haven’t been to a football game in years we lose all of the time anyways.

College I don’t think there’s anything wrong with being a farmer.

College I used to lay bricks in the summers and I loved it.

 

College I am a white man most philosophers are white men and almost all of the books you told

            me to read were written by white men when can you show me the world and my place in

            it through someone else’s eyes?

College why do you charge so much for tuition?

College are you worried about going out of business?

College you realize that as long as the people who are working on solving the world’s problems

            and the people who are creating new problems for the world are on your payroll at the

            same time you have nothing to worry about, right?

 

I skip class every day that I can.

I lie in bed for weeks at a time staring at the ceiling.

When I go to parties I always drink too much and never have any fun.

I’ve decided to rebel.

You should have seen me working in the factory.

I won’t do a keg stand.

I have dark thoughts and bright ideas.

My emotional physical and psychological health are declining but at least I know

            the various solutions to the Schrodinger equation.

 

I’m trying to have a conversation.

Are you going to let your curriculum be decided by the job market?

I constantly ponder the job market.

I look for jobs every day.

The signs for the job fair line the walks to my philosophy class.

I consider the job market while I’m eating beans camping in my tent.

It’s always telling me I should make a lot of money. Doctors want a lot of money. Chemists want

            a lot of money. Everybody wants a lot of money except me.

Sometimes I worry that I am college.

I am contradicting myself again.

 

The uneducated want to kill me.

I’ll be on the ends of their pitch forks in no time.

I should think about what I can offer.

I have a tattered backpack thousands of suicides 1.2 trillion dollars in student loan debt an empty

            idea journal and millions and millions of liberal arts degrees.

Not to mention my publications or the thousands of undergrads suffocating from the air filling

            my classrooms.

My goal is to find the Truth despite the fact that I know it doesn’t exist.

 

College how can I write my paper with your constant buzzing?

I’ll trudge on like Lewis and Clark my thoughts as uninhabited as the territories they explored.

College for a limited time only I’ll sell you two of my ideas for the price of one.

College stop Donald Trump.

College save free speech.

College black lives must matter.

College I am the 99%.

College if I can hear the colors of the trees outside of my window vibrating does that mean I had

            too much coffee?

College after high school I was a house keeper in New Zealand my coworkers where uneducated

Filipino immigrants they were so kind none of us had any money but we got along and

we were all happy life was simpler in 1491 and Walden Pond sounds like a nice place to

raise a family. We must all be crazy.

College you don’t really want to give your students a better future.

College I never had the chance to thank you for the anxiety migraines and panic attacks that

            made me miss half of my classes sophomore year.

 

That ain’t no good. Shiiiit. You wanna make people talk good.

College this is ridiculous.

College this is how it seems walking around our campus.

College am I right?

Well I suppose I should write my poem now.

It’s true I don’t want to be rich and I’d rather be happy than know calculus

            besides my calculator just happens to be broken at the moment.

College I’m putting my calloused hands all over your quill.

***

(Sterling, CO -- March, 2016)

My task over spring break during that very same poetry class was to write an imitation poem. I was stuck on this for a long time until, as I crossed the border into Colorado on a semi-ill-fated road trip to the Grand Canyon, inspiration struck! I pulled off of the highway to spend the night in Sterling, Colorado. I sat on the hood of my 2001 Buick Century in the parking lot of the motel with my notebook and my Ginsberg book open on my lap as the sun set, jotting down all of my frustrations with my time in college. 

100 Breaths

100. 99. 98. You’re breathing deeply, eyes shut.

In and out. More and more slowly,

feeling the air inflate your lungs with each breath.

 

95. With each long exhale, you sink deeper.

Did I study enough for my exam you begin to ask.

Let that thought go.

Get back to your breaths, each an emblem of this moment.

 

90. Your scattered mind, being assaulted by the day ahead

finally begins to slow.

 

80. Like waves coming and going,

The past is lost, and the future remains unknown.

 

72. A car honks. Move on.

 

68. Focus. Return to your center,

let the world blow past you like a warm breeze.

Feel your surroundings getting darker and darker.

With each repetition, the numbers start to get lost.

 

47. You think, but you aren’t sure.

 

No need to count anymore, it just clouds your mind.

 

You briefly wonder how long it has been, but it doesn’t matter.

 

Sounds and worries seldom get all the way to your tranquil mind.

 

Time passes.

 

In.

 

Out.

***

(Minneapolis, MN -- February, 2016)

I wrote this poem for a poetry class I took pass/fail in college (I passed!). The assignment was to write a poem in the second person perspective. I took inspiration from a breathing exercise I did most mornings before class. At first, I didn't really like this poem because there's nothing flashy about it, but I've come to enjoy its simplicity.

 

Ode to the Dying Bee

’Fore me climbed a bee on fallen leaf and

Under the crisp, cool, blue October sky

Prepar’d herself a lonesome death as I

Wondered why- is this not what she had planned?

 

‘Tis said that in the warrior’s native land,

Like that of the Viking fierce or Spart’n proud

And o’ the bee too where fear’s not allowed

The only proud passing comes on field at foe’s hand.

 

Mem’ries of battles and sweet nectar dis’vowed

Wishing she had died deliv’ring a sting.

And as she, full of shame, spent final breath

Driven by disgrace from the comb-dwelt crowd,

She lay ‘fore me on this leaf lamenting

That she had not died an honorable death.

***

(Minneapolis, MN -- October, 2015)

I'm pretty sure this is the first poem I ever wrote, and honestly, it went downhill from this for a while! Fearless and ignorant, I wrote this sonnet after seeing a bee staggering around by a fallen leaf. It became still, and I realized that it had died. Everything I know about worker bees is that they're so dedicated to service to the hive that it must be considered selfish to die in such a "meaningless" way. I remembered learning about sonnets in high school, so I gave it try! I promise my style modernized a bit since then. 

Why Am I Doing This?

For my entire life, sports and exercise were my outlet for stress. Then, in 2015, I broke my ankle in a pickup game of basketball. I needed a new way to cope with my feelings and anxiety, and I discovered poetry. At first, my desire to write came from a frustration for not being able to find poems that I related to 100%, so I started creating the kinds of verses I'd hope to discover in the wild. Since then, writing has slowly become a bigger and bigger part of my life to the point where I currently have hundreds (if not thousands) of poems stashed away in 3-ring binders. I've finally worked up the courage to start submitting some for publication, but the harsh reality is that a lot of my favorite poems, whether they're technically sound or not, likely will never be published in journals due to their style or themes. Because of that, I've decided to create this blog where I can post some of my favorite throwback poems that might not find any love elsewhere.

With that being the case, here's what you can expect. I'll try to submit a handful of poems a couple times each month with short discussions attached. I'll try to work in chronological order (more or less) from my oldest stuff to my newest stuff. Finally, I'm going to avoid making too many further revisions. I want to document my progress as a writer, so any stylistic matters that I've since improved upon will be left as they originally were written. 

Enjoy!