Tag Archives: poems

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Thinking about time, Misao Okawa, Van Gogh, and Delmore Schwartz

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This week I am taking a short detour off of the poetic superhighway, perhaps into the philosophical ‘weeds’, but nonetheless, here’s what’s on my mind today. A news story that I read earlier in the month at first amused me, then it nagged at me for so long that I returned to the article for a re-read. My take away on the re-read disturbed me.

The article that I am referring to is one of many that appeared on various internet newsfeeds, as well as in the print and broadcast news media. It announced the birthday of the world’s oldest living human, Misao Okawa of Japan. Ms. Okawa, who on March 5 of this year, celebrated her 117th birthday, made her numero uno of the supercentenarians, a supercentenarian being defined as a person older than 110 years of age.

In any case, it was a ‘feel good’ article, and Ms. Okawa, who appears to be mentally sharp, and in good physical condition for a person of her age, had quite a lot to say to interviewers. Most noteworthy of her comments was one regarding life in general.

“It seemed quite short,” said Ms. Okawa.

I was stunned. If the life of the world’s oldest human seemed, “quite short”, what hope is there for the rest of us. As a time junkie, I calculated that Ms. Okawa was 57 years of age when I was born – a lady well into middle age at that time. Now in her later years, her she was telling us that, in effect, it had all passed very quickly.

Get it done, make the list, and make sure you get as much in as you can, because you only have your ‘allotted’ years. That’s what I take away from Ms. Okawa’s interview. If you want to write, paint, improve yourself, or travel to the ends of the earth, there is no better day to put a plan in place than today. If you want to build a cabin in the Rockies, ride a horse, jump a freight train to Calgary, or rekindle a lost romance, do it now.

Some of us are allowed many years, others of us few. Yesterday, March 30th, marked the passing of one who was allotted few years. It was the birth date of Vincent Van Gogh. Van Gogh was allowed only 37 years on this planet before insanity drove him to kill himself in July of 1890. In his wake he left a legacy of art that will survive him by millenniums (if civilization survives that long).

So this is where I am today, midway between Van Gogh’s birthday, and the first of April. Do I have a poem in mind for this occasion…well I do, but it’s not one that I wrote. It’s one of my favorite poems, and it contains one of my favorite poetic lines:

“…time is the fire in which we burn”

This line is from a poem by Delmore Schwartz, titled “Calmly we walk through this April day”. This poem describes an April day in New York City in 1937. I hope that you enjoy it.

Oh…by the way…
Ms. Okawa was asked the secret of her longevity.
She said, “I wonder about that too.”

Mahalo
ed

W E Patterson's avatar

Sandhills expedition

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don’t kiss me good-night
— tonight
sweet Nebraska
don’t let me
die in search
of that
elusive Valentine
don’t call me
names for the sake
of trying to change
my mind
don’t call the place
I’m in – devoid
of sensory pleasure
don’t call the road
I’ve travelled – sublime
or call me one of the
fortunate few,
and
don’t read the last
words that I wrote
to you and
call it literature
or the last poem
I wrote for you
and whisper
the last 4 lines
to me from the comfort
of
your cellular phone
from your loft in
San Francisco
or from your cabin
in Oregon
…so, just let me be
here
in
sweet Nebraska
with its golden half moon
pushing up over
Scotts Bluff
with Wyoming
being its own same self
to the west
and the wind from
Manitoba wafting through
the open windows
of the 1970 Travelall
let me pitch my tent
in the shadow of
Highway 20
…underfed lanky coyotes of
doom howl
in the distance,
give me one more
night
before I go home.

W E Patterson's avatar

Phil

. Poetry . . 4 Comments

Last weekend

he cleaned the garage

and sorted the recyclables

and he separated

the plastic bottles from the glass

the green glass from the brown

and he put them into their

appropriate containers

and he stacked the papers

into perfectly arranged sheaves

of old tired news

and bound them with twine

and lugged them to the curb

…and mid-yard…

he  paused to expunge

a delinquent dandelion from their

recently clipped and finely fertilized

Kentucky Bluegrass lawn

and to adjust an errant sprinkler head

so as to insure proper irrigation

of the geranium bed

and he inspected the marigolds

for spider mites

and the chrysanths

for mealybugs

and the vine tomatoes

for flea beetles

after which,

he left his gardening gloves

on the arm of the porch swing

and his rubber muck boots

on the mat

by the front door

and he left his house key in the

candy dish on the entryway bench

his pipe in the agate ashtray

and heated a kettle for tea

and drew water for a bath

and then he

laid on the sofa to rest

and so…

…it was just…

as his widow told me

his time.

W E Patterson's avatar

The High Line Drifter’s Lament

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April is National Poetry Month, so I want to post a couple of pieces of poetry that I have written. These poems have all appeared elsewhere. This poem, The High Line Drifter’s Lament, is one that I wrote several years ago. The High Line is a railroad freight line that runs between Seattle, Washington, and Minneapolis, Minnesota, in the United States. It passes just south of the U.S., Canadian border, and crosses the states of Washington, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota and Minnesota.

Back during the 1980s and 1990s, the High Line was terrorized by a gang called the “Freight Train Riders Association”. This gang was responsible for lots of violence along this stretch of track, particularly in the state of Montana. People who illegally rode freight trains were fearful.

The High Line Drifter’s Lament

I was riding on the High Line, on a trip across the plains,

Passing south of Enumclaw, soaked from late night rains,

Riding fifteen hundred miles, across the northern tier,

Choking hard on cheap red wine, cursing hard the fear,

I got a second hand Hi-Standard; I keep it in my pack,

I sleep with one eye open, because I have to make it back,

An old timer told me in Spokane, while we were playing cards,

How thugs had come to terrorize the rails and the yards,

They found a man in Kalispell, a month ago today,

He didn’t have a home or name, but now he has a grave,

They’re rolling drunks, and killing men, and raising lots of hell,

Killing them that ain’t like them, and anyone who’ll tell,

They don’t give any warning, and they don’t make any sound,

They’ll shoot you dead and disappear before the bull’s next round,

So I take a chance, I check my piece, keep my back against the wall,

In thirty two more hours I’ll be with you in St. Paul,

By morning light this train will pass, from the mountains to the farms,

And I’ll be that much closer to the shelter of your arms.

W E Patterson's avatar

A farewell to Roger Ebert…Reflections on the Atomic Bar…

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The other day, when I heard the news of Robert Ebert’s death, I had one of my ‘mortality moments’.  I have mentioned ‘mortality moments’ before in this blog, most notably regarding the passing of John Glenn and George McGovern. Mortality moments are when someone, usually a celebrity, and usually someone that you have not given a whole lot of thought to in awhile, but whose name is a household word — that kind of person, leaves this world behind. All of a sudden you realize that humans are not meant to stay here indefinitely. You think that if ______________ is gone (fill in the blank), then it is not inconceivable that my day will be here before I know it and I should, therefore, make good use of the time I am allotted.

Roger Ebert, who won the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism in 1974 was not someone who I had thought a lot about recently, although I did hear that he had battled cancer for some years. Though I was not a huge Roger Ebert fan, if someone walked up to me on the street and asked me to name a movie critic, I would say Roger Ebert. If they asked me to name a second I would say Gene Siskel and if pressed for a third I probably couldn’t come up with another name. This is possibly because I am not a huge movie buff, but I am a huge fan of good criticism and when it is professionally delivered by someone of Mr. Ebert’s caliber, it can be quite entertaining and useful. This leads me to question the future of movie critics in general. With journalists abandoning the profession in droves, is it possible that ‘movie critic’ will one day be added to the ever growing list of obsolete professions, alongside Boomsquires, Lamplighters and Town Criers. I think it is possible.

Reviews abound today on everything from books, to movies, to computers, and toasters, just name it, everyone is becoming a reviewer. Before I purchase a book, I usually read the reviews on Amazon, reviews that were made by people who have simply read the book, and now thanks to the internet, have a platform upon which to cast their proverbial thumbs up, or thumbs down. A gentleman I know, who has published a number of novels, insists that a spate of negative reviews on his recently released book is due to his recent divorce, his ex-wife and her friends being the culprits in the negative comment flurry.

In any case, Mr. Ebert published a very moving essay, regarding his thoughts on his impending death. This essay has been all over the internet of late, but I will provide a link here  for those who may not have read it. It is required reading for those who feel that they themselves will one day die.  Although I do not subscribe to Mr. Ebert’s conviction that nothing exists beyond death, I can offer no evidence to the contrary.

*

My friend Tulip called the other night. Tulip used to live in Plantation, Florida, but she lives out in Los Angeles now and is applying to enter a Film Studies, PhD program. She asked if I still had a poem that I wrote some years ago, back in the late 90’s. The poem was written in the far hours of the morning, on the back of a cocktail napkin, just outside of the bowling alley at the now defunct and demolished Showboat Casino on the Boulder Strip in Las Vegas. I haven’t touched the poem since I wrote it, and I reprint it now in its original gin-stained condition — for Tulip:

The Atomic Bar

Past the Boulder Highway,

Over on Santa Fe,

Light years off the Strip,

Lydia stands on the Atomic Bar.

Yells: “don’t mess with Texas”,

She sings a cowboy song.

It’s a sad state for her native state.

It’s a sad state for her current state.

No harm is ever done in the desert.

No harm done to the present,

She’s bad news says Glenn,

The California Biker turned,

Full time Atomic Bomb.

Said he wanted to move to Saba,

But came here to do it right.

Sold his bike in Fresno.

When he gave into it.

No time like the present.

He lives in it, and drinks it in all day.

But he respects it always. Takes it for what it is.

He picks up a six pack of Coors silos,

Next door at the liquor store, then,

He walks off into the night.

He knows, long nights are often,

Just around forever. Bike’s gone.

Sugar’s gone. Atomic Bar is open,

All night long, every day.

New faces. Some come in painted.

Like figures on the wall,

Night refugees down from the Nugget.

Lydia says Greg Allman makes,

Her life worth living.

She’s sinking fast,

At the Atomic Bar.

*

Or at least that’s how I remember that night…

Mahalo,

Ed